UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


UNIVERSITY  of  CALIFORNIA 

AT 


Che  flutocrat 

of  the 

Breakfast 
Cable 


147310 


A 


THE  AUTOCRAT 

OF  THE 

BREAKFAST-TABLE 


EVERY  MAN    HIS  OWN  BOSWELL. 
^ 

I  was  just  going  to  say,  when  I  was  inter- 
rupted, that  one  of  the  many  ways  of  classifying 
minds  is  under  the  heads  of  arithmetical  and 
algebraical  intellects.  All  economical  and  prac- 
tical wisdom  is  an  extension  or  variation  of  the 
following  arithmetical  formula:  24-2=4.  Every 
philosophical  proposition  has  the  more  general 
character  of  the  expression  a-\-b=c.  We  are 
mere  operatives,  empirics,  and  egotists,  until 
we  learn  to  think  in  letters  instead  of  figures. 

They  all  stared.  There  is  a  divinity  student 
lately  come  among  us  to  whom  I  commonly  ad- 
dress remarks  like  the  above,  allowing  him  to 
take  a  certain  share  in  the  conversation,  so  far 
as  assent  or  pertinent  questions  are  involved.  He 
abused  his  liberty  on  this  occasion  by  presum- 
ing to  say  that  Leibnitz  had  the  same  obser- 
vation.— No,  sir,  I  replied,  he  has  not.  But 
3 


4     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

he  said  a  mighty  good  thing  about  mathematics, 
that  sounds  something  like  it,  and  you  found  it, 
not  in  the  original,  but  quoted  by  Dr.  Thomas 
Reid.  I  will  tell  the  company  what  he  did  say, 
one  of  these  days. 

If  I  belong  to  a  Society  of  MutuaLAdmi.- 

jratipji^=_J--blush  to  say  that  I  do  not  at  this 
present  moment.  I  once  did,  however.  It  was 
the  first  association  to  which  I  ever  heard  the 
term  applied;  a  body  of  scientific  young  men  in 
a  great  foreign  city  who  admired  their  teacher, 
and  to  some  extent  each  other.  Many  of  them 
deserved  it;  they  have  become  famous  since. 
It  amuses  me  to  hear  the  talk  of  one  of  those 
beings  described  by  Thackeray — 

"Letters  four  do  form  his  name" — 

about  a  social  development  which  belongs  to 
the  very  noblest  stage  of  civilization.  All  gen- 
erous companies  of  artists,  authors,  philanthro- 
pists, men  of  science,  are,  or  ought  to  be,  So- 
cieties of  Mutual  Admiration.  A  man  of  genius, 
or  any  kind  of  superiority,  is  not  debarred  from 
admiring  the  same  quality  in  another,  nor  the 
other  from  returning  his  admiration.  They 
may  even  associate  together  and  continue  to 
think  highly  of  each  other.  And  so  of  a  dozen 
such  men,  if  any  one  place  is  fortunate  enough 
to  hold  so  many.  The  being  referred  to  above 
assumes  several  false  premises.  First ._that  men 
of  talent  necessarily- hat£__each  other.  Secondly^ 
that  intimate  knowledge  or  habitual  association 
destroys  our  admiration  of  persons  whom  we 
esteemed  highly  at  a  distance.  Thirdly,  that  a 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    5 

circle  of  clever  fellows,  who  meet  together  to 
dine  and  have  a  good  time,  have  signed  a  con- 
stitutional compact  to  glorify  themselves  and  put 
— down  him  and  the  fraction  of  the  human  race 
not  belonging  to  their  number.  Fourthly, 
that  it  is  an  outrage  that  he  is  not  asked  to  join 
them. 

Here  the  company  laughed  a  good  deal,  and 
the  old  gentleman  who  sits  opposite  said,"That's 
it!  that's  it!" 

I  continued,  for  I  was  in  the  talking  vein. 
As  to  clever  people's  hating  each  other,  I  think 
a  little  extra  talent  does  sometimes  make  people 
jealous.  They  become  irritated  by  perpetual 
attempts  and  failures,  and  it  hurts  their  tempers 
and  dispositions.  Unpretending  mediocrity  is 
good,  and  genius  is  glorious;  but  a  weak  flavor 
of  genius  in  an  essentially  commDn  person  is 
detestable.  It  spoils  the  grand  neutrality  of 
a  commonplace  character,  as  the  rinsings  of  an 
unwashed  wineglass  spoil  a  draught  of  fair  water. 
No  wonder  the  poor  fellow  we  spoke  of,  who 
always  belongs  to  this  class  of  slightly  flavored 
mediocrities,  is  puzzled  and  vexed  by  the 
strange  sight  of  a  dozen  men  of  capacity  work- 
ing and  playing  together  in  harmony.  He  and 
his  fellows  are  always  fighting.  With  them  fa- 
miliarity naturally  breeds  contempt.  If  they 
ever  praise  each  other's  bad  drawings,  or  broken- 
winded  novels,  or  spavined  verses,  nobody  ever 
supposed  it  was  from  admiration;  it  was  simply 
a  contract  between  themselves  and  a  publisher 
or  dealer. 

If  the    Mutuals  have    really    nothing   among 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 


them  worth  admiring,  that  alters  the  question. 
But  if  they  are  men  with  noble  powers  and 
qualities, let  me  tell  you,  that,  next  to  youthful 
love  and  family  affection,  there  is  no  human 
sentiment  better  than  that  \\hich  unites  the  So 
cieties  of  Mutual  Admiration.  And  what  would 
literature  or  art  be  without  such  associations  ? 
Who  can  tell  what  we  owe  to  the  Mutual  Ad- 
miration Society  of  which  Shakespeare,  and  Ben 
Johnson,  and  Beaumont  and  Fletcher  were 
members?  Or  to  that  of  which  Addison  and 
Steele  formed  the  center,  and  which  gave  us 
the  Spectator?  Or  to  that  where  Johnson,  ancf 
Goldsmith,  and  Burke,  and  Reynolds,  and 
Beauclerk,  and  Boswell,  most  admiring  among 
all  admirers,  met  together?  Was  there  any 
great  harm  in  the  fact  that  the  Irvings  and 
Paulding  wrote  in  company?  or  any  unpardon- 
able cabal  in  the  literary  union  of  Verplanck 
and  Bryant  and  Sands,  and  as  many  more  as 
they  chose  to  associate  with  them? 

The  poor  creature  does  not  know  what  he  is 
talking  about,  when  he  abuses  this  noblest  of 
institutions.  Let  him  inspect  its  mysteries 
through  the  knot-hole  he  has  secuted,  but  not 
use  that  orifice  as  a  medium  for  his  popgun. 
Such  a  society  is  the  crown  of  a  literary  rretrop- 
olis;  if  a  town  has  not  material  for  it,  and 
spirit  and  good  feeling  enough  to  organize  it,  it 
is  a  mere  caravansary,  fit  for  a  man  of  genius 
to  lodge  in,  but  not  to  live  in.  Foolish  people 
hate  and  dread  and  envy  such  an  association  of 
men  of  varied  powers  and  influence,  because  it 
is  lofty,  serene,  impregnable,  and,  by  the  neces- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE      7 

sity  of  the  case,  exclusive.  Wise  ones  are 
prouder  of  the  title  M.  S.  M.  A.  than  of  all 
their  other  honors  put  together. 

All  generous  minds  have  a  horror  of  what 

are  commonly  called  "facts  "  They  are  the 
brute  beasts  of  the  intellectual  domain.  Who 
does  not  know  fellows  that  always  have  an  ill- 
conditioned  fact  or  two  that  they  lead  after 
them  into  decent  company  like  so  many  bull- 
dogs, ready  to  let  them  slip  at  every  ingenious 
suggestion,  or  convenient  generalization,  or 
pleasant  fancy?  I  allow  no  "facts"  at  this 
table.  What!  Because  bread  is  good  and 
wholesome  and  necessary  and  nourishing,  shall 
you  thrust  a  crumb  into  my  windpipe  while  I 
am  talking?  Do  not  these  muscles  of  mine  rep- 
resent a  hundred  loaves  of  bread?  and  is  not  my 
thought  the  abstract  of  ten  thousand  of  these 
crumbs  of  truth  with  which  you  would  choke  off 
my  speech? 

[The  above  remark  must  be  conditioned  and 
qualified  for  the  vulgar  mind.  The  reader 
will  of  course  understand  the  precise  amount  of 
seasoning  which  must  be  added  to  it  before  he 
adopts  it  as  one  of  the  axioms  of  his  life.  The 
speaker  disclaims  all  responsibility  for  its  abuse 
in  incompetent  hands.] 

This  business  of  conversation  is  a  very  serious 
matter.  There  are  men  that  it  weakens  one  to 
talk  with  an  hour  more  than  a  day's  fasting 
would  do.  Mark  this  that  I  am  going  to  say, 
for  it  is  as  good  as  a  working  professional  man's 
advice,  and  costs  you  nothing:  It  is  better  to 
lose  a  pint  of  blood  from  your  veins  than  to 


8     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

have  a  nerve  tapped.  Nobody  measures  your 
nervous  force  as  it  runs  away,  nor  bandages 
your  brain  and  marrow  after  the  operation. 

There  are  men  of  esprit  who  are  excessively 
exhausting  to  some  people.  They  are  the 
talkers  that  have  what  may  be  called  jerky 
minds.  Their  thoughts  do  not  run  in  the  nat- 
ural order  of  sequence.  They  say  bright  things 
on  all  possible  subjects,  but  their  zigzags  rack 
you  to  death.  After  a  jolting  half-hcur  with 
one  of  these  jerky  companions,  talking  with  a 
dull  friend  affords  great  relief.  It  is  like  taking 
the  cat  in  your  lap  after  holding  a  squirrel. 

What  a  comfort  a  dull  but  kindly  person  is, 
to  be  sure,  at  times!  A  ground-glass  shade 
over  a  gas  lamp  does  not  bring  more  solace  to 
our  dazzled  eye  than  such  a  one  to  our  minds. 

"Do  not  dull  people  bore  you?"  said  one  of 
the  lady-boarders,— the  same  that  sent  me  her 
autograph  book  last  week  with  a  request  for  a 
few  original  stanzas,  not  remembering  that  "The 
Pactolian"  pays  me  five  dollars  a  line  for  every 
thing  I  write  in  its  columns. 

"Madam,"  said  I  (she  and  the  century  were 
in  their  teens  together),  "all  men  are  bores,  ex- 
cept when  we  want  them.  There  never  was  but 
one  man  that  I  would  trust  with  my  latch-key." 

"Who  might  that  favored  person  be?" 

"Zimmermann." 

The  men  of  genius  that  I  fancy  most  have 
erectile  heads  like  the  cobra-di-capello.  You 
remember  what  they  tell  of  William  Pinkney, 
the  great  pleader;  how  in  his  eloquent  parox- 
ysms the  veins  of  his  neck  would  swell  and  his 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE      Q 

face  flush  and  his  eyes  glitter,  until  he  seemed 
on  the  verge  of  apoplexy.  The  hydraulic  ar- 
rangements for  supplying  the  brain  with  blood 
are  only  second  in  importance  to  its  own  organ- 
ization. The  bulbous-headed  fellows  that  steam 
well  when  they  are  at  work  are  the  men  that 
draw  big  audiences  and  give  us  marrowy  books 
and  pictures.  It  is  a  good  sign  to  have  one's 
feet  grow  cold  when  he  is  writing.  A  great 
writer  and  speaker  once  told  me  that  he  often 
wrote  with  his  feet  in  hot  water;  but  for  this, 
all  his  blood  would  have  run  into  his  head,  as 
the  mercury  sometimes  withdraws  into  the  ball 
of  a  thermometer. 

You  don't  suppose  that  my  remarks  made 

at  this  table  are  like  so  many  postage-stamps, 
do  you, — each  to  be  only  once  uttered?  If  you 
do,  you  are  mistaken.  He  must  be  a  poor  crea- 
ture that  does  not  often  repeat  himself.  Im- 
agine the  author  of  the  excellent  piece  of 
advice,  "Know  thyself,"  never  alluding  to  that 
sentiment  again  during  the  course  of  a  protract- 
ed existence!  Why,  the  truths  a  man  carries 
about  with  him  are~riis~TcroTs;  and  do  you  think 
a  carpenter  is  bound  to  use  the  same  plane  but 
once  to  smooth  a  knotty  board  with,  or  to  hang 
up  his  hammer  after  it  has  driven  its  first  nail? 
I  shall  never  repeat  a  conversation, but  an  idea 
often.  I  shall  use  the  same  types  when  I  like, 
but  not  commonly  the  same  stereotypes.  A 
thought  is  often  original,  though  you  have  ut- 
tered it  a  hundred  times.  It  has  come  to  you 
over  a  new  route,  by  a  new  and  express  train  of 
associations. 


IO    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Sometimes,  but  rarely,  one  may  be  caught 
making  the  same  speech  twice  over,  and  yet  be 
held  blameless.  Thus,  a  certain  lecturer,  after 
performing  in  an  inland  city,  where  dwells  a 
Litteratrice  of  note,  was  invited  to  meet  her 
and  others  over  the  social  teacup.  She  pleas- 
antly referred  to  his  many  wanderings  in  his 
new  occupation.  "Yes,"  he  replied,  "I  am  like 
the  Huma,  the  bird  that  never  lights,  being  al- 
ways in  the  cars,  as  he  is  always  on  the  wing." — 
Years  elapsed.  The  lecturer  visited  the  same 
place  once  more  for  the  same  purpose.  An- 
other social  cup  after  the  lecture,  and  a  second 
meeting  with  the  distinguished  lady.  "You  are 
constantly  going  from  place  to  place,"  she  said. — 
"Yes,"  he  answered,  "I  am  like  the  Huma," — 
and  finished  the  sentence  as  before. 

What  horrors,  when  it  flashed  over  him  that 
he  had  made  this  fine  speech,  word  for  word, 
twice  over!  Yet  it  was  not  true,  as  the  lady 
might  perhaps  have  fairly  inferred,  that  he  had 
embellished  his  conversation  with  the  Huma 
daily  during  that  whole  interval  of  years.  On 
the  contrary,  he  had  never  once  thought  of  the 
odious  fowl  until  the  recurrence  of  precisely  the 
same  circumstances  brought  up  precisely  the 
same  idea.  He  ought  to  have  been  proud  of 
the  accuracy  of  his  mental  adjustments.  Given 
certain  factors,  and  a  sound  brain  should  al- 
ways evolve  the  same  fixed  product  with  the 
certainty  of  Babbage's  calculating  machine. 

What  a  satire,  by  the  way,  is  that  machine 

on  the    mere    mathematician!     A  Frankenstein 
monster,  a  thing    without   brains   and    without 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    II 

heart,  too  stupid  to  make  a  blunder;  that  turns 
out  formulae  like  a  corn-sheller,  and  never 
grows  any  wiser  or  better,  though  it  grind  a 
thousand  bushels  of  them! 

I  have  an  immense  respect  for  a  man  of  tal- 
ent plus  "the  mathematics."  But  the  calculat- 
ing power  alone  should  seem  to  be  the  least  hu- 
man of  qualities,  and  to  have  the  smallest 
amount  of  reason  in  it;  since  a  machine  can  be 
made  to  do  the  work  of  three  or  four  calculators, 
and  better  than  any  one  of  them.  Sometimes 
I  have  been  troubled  that  I  had  not  a  deeper 
intuitive  apprehension  of  the  relations  of  num- 
bers. But  the  triumph  of  the  ciphering  hand- 
organ  has  consoled  me.  I  always  fancy  I  can 
hear  the  wheels  clicking  in  a  calculator's  brain. 
The  power  of  dealing  with  numbers  is  a  kind  of 
"detached  lever"  arrangement,  which  may  be 
put  into  a  mighty  poor  watch.  I  suppose  it  is 
about  as  common  as  the  power  of  moving  the 
ears  voluntarily,  which  is  a  moderately  rare  en- 
dowment. 

-UttleUox»4i«<^--pmvet&rand  little  narrow 

streaks  of  specialized  knowledge,  are  things 
men  are  very  apt  to  be  conceited  about.  Na- 
ture is  very  wise;  but  for  this  encouraging  prin- 
ciple how  many  small  talents  and  little  accom- 
plishments would  be  neglected!  Talk  about 
conceit  as  much  as  you  like,  it  is  to  human 
character  what  salt  is  to  the  ocean;  it  keeps 
it  sweet,  and  renders  it  endurable.  Say  rather 
it  is  like  the  natural  unguent  of  the  sea-fowl's 
plumage  which  enables  him  to  shed  the  rain 
that  falls  on  him  and  the  wave  in  which  he  dips. 


12    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

When  one  has  had  all  his  conceit  taken  out  of 
him,  when  he  has  lost  all  his  illusions,  his 
feathers  will  soon  soak  through,  and  he  will  fly 
no  more. 

So  you  admire  conceited  people,  do  you?  said 
the  young  lady  who  has  come  to  the  city  to  be 
finished  off  for— the  duties  of  life. 

I  am  afraid  you  do  not  study  logic  at  your 
school,  my  dear.  It  does  not  follow  that  I  wish 
to  be  pickled  in  brine  because  I  like  a  salt- 
water plunge  at  Nahant.  I  say  that  conceit  is 
just  as  natural  a  thing  to  human  minds  as  a 
center  is  to  a  circle.  But  little-minded  peo- 
ple's thoughts  move  in  such  small  circles  that 
five  minutes'  conversation  gives  you  an  arc 
long  enough  to  determine  their  whole  curve. 
An  arc  in  the  movement  of  a  large  intellect 
does  not  sensibly  differ  from  a  straight  line. 
Even  if  it  have  the  third  vowel  as  its  center,  it 
does  not  soon  betray  it.  The  highest  thought, 
that  is,  is  the  most  seemingly  impersonal;  it 
does  not  obviously  imply  any  individual  center. 

Audacious  self-esteem,  with  good  ground  for 
it,  is  always  imposing.  What  resplendent 
beauty  that  must  have  been  which  could  have 
authorized  Phryne  to  "peel"  in  the  way  she  did! 
What  fine  speeches  are  those  two:  "Non  omnis 
moriar"  and  "I  have  taken  all  knowledge  to  be 
my  province"!  Even  in  common  people,  con- 
ceit has  the  virtue  of  making  them  cheerful;  the 
man  who  thinks  his  wife,  hi?  baby,  his  house, 
his  horse,  his_  dog,  and  himself  severally  un- 
equaled,  is  almosf  sure  to  be  a  good-humored 
person,  though  liable  to  be  tedious  at  times. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    13 

What  are  the  great  faults  of  conversation  ? 

Want    of    ideas,  want  of    words,  want  of  man- 
ners, are"  the   principal   ones,    I   suppose  you  I 
think.      I  don't    doubt    it,  but    I    will  tell    you  N 
what  I  have  found  spoil  more  good  talks    than  / 
anything    else; —  long    arguments    on    special 
points  between  people  who  differ  on  the  funda- 
mental principles  upon  which  these  points    de- 
pend.    No  men  can  have  satisfactory  relations 
with  each  other  until  they  have  agreed    on   cer- 
tain ultimata  of  belief  not    to    be    disturbed   in     i 
ordinary    conversation,  and    unless    they    have 
sense  enough  to  trace  the   secondary    questions 
depending  upon  these  ultimate    beliefs  to    their 
source.     In  short,  just  as  a  written  constitution 
is  essential  to  the  best    social    order,  so  a  code 
of  finalities  is  a  necessary  condition  of  profitable 
talk  between  two  persons.   Talking  is  like  play- 
ing on  the  harp;  there  is  as  much  in    laying  the    . 
hand  on  the  strings  to  stop  their    vibrations    as 
in  twanging  them  to  bring  out  their  music. 

Do  you  mean  to  say  the  pun-question  is  not 

clearly  settled  in  your  minds?  Let  me  lay  down 
the  law  upon  the  subject.  Life  and  language 
are  alike  sacred.  Homicide  and  verbicide — that 
is,  violent  treatment  of  a  word  with  fatal  re- 
sults to  its  legitimate  meaning,  which  is  its  life — 
are  alike  forbidden.  Manslaughter,  which  is 
the  meaning  of  the  one,  is  the  same  as  man's 
laughter,  which  is  the  end  of  the  other.  A  pun 
is  prima  facie  an  insult  to  the  person  you  are 
talking  with.  It  implies  utter  indifference  to  or 
sublime  contempt  for  his  remarks,  no  matter 
how  serious.  I  speak  of  total  depravity,  and 


14    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

one  says  all  that  is  written  on  the  subject  is 
deep  raving.  I  have  committed  my  self-respect 
by  talking  with  such  a  person.  I  should  like  to 
commit  him,  but  cannot,  because  he  is  a  nui- 
sance. Or  I  speak  of  geological  convulsions, 
and  he  asks  me  what  was  the  cosine  of  Noah's 
ark;  also,  whether  the  Deluge  was  not  a  deal 
huger  than  any  modern  inundation. 

A  pun  does  not  commonly  justify  a  blow  in 
return.  But  if  a  blow  were  given  for  such  a 
cause,  and  death  ensued,  the  jury  would  be 
judge  both  of  the  facts  and  of  the  pun,  and 
might,  if  the  latter  were  of  an  aggravated  char- 
acter, return  a  verdict  of  justifiable  homicide. 
Thus,  in  a  case  lately  decided  before  Miller,}., 
Doe  presented  Roe  a  subscription  paper,  and 
urged  the  claims  of  suffering  humanity.  Roe 
replied  by  asking,  When  charity  was  like  a  top? 
It  was  in  evidence  that  Doe  preserved  a  dignified 
silence.  Roe  then  said,  "When  it  begins  to 
hum."  Doe  then — and  not  till  then — struck 
Roe,  and  his  head  happening  to  strike  a  bound 
volume  of  the  Monthly  Rag-bag  and  Stolen 
Miscellany,  intense  mortification  ensued,  with 
a  fatal  result.  The  chief  laid  down  his  notions 
of  the  law  to  his  brother  justices,  who  unani- 
mously replied,  "Jest  so."  The  chief  rejoined, 
that  no  man  should  jest  so  without  being  pun- 
ished for  it,  and  charged  for  the  prisoner,  who 
was  acquitted,  and  the  pun  ordered  to  be  burned 
by  the  sheriff.  The  bound  volume  was  forfeited 
as  a  deodand,  but  not  claimed. 

People  that  make  puns  are  like  wanton  boys 
ythat  put  coppers  on  the  railroad  tracks.  They 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    15 

amuse  themselves  and  other  children,  but  their 
little  trick  may  upset  a  freight  train  of  conver- 
sation for  the  sake  of  a  battered  witticism. 

I  will  thank  you,  B.  F.,  to  bring  down  two 
books,  of  which  I  will  mark  the  places  on  this 
slip  of  paper.  (While  he  is  gone,  I  may  say 
that  this  boy,  our  landlady's  youngest,  is  called 
BENJAMIN  FRANKLIN,  after  the  celebrated 
philosopher  of  that  name.  A  highly  merited 
compliment.) 

I  wished  to  refer  to  two  eminent  authorities. 
Now  be  so  good  as  to  listen.  The  great  moral- 
ist says:  "To  trifle  with  the  vocabulary  which 
is  the  vehicle  to  social  intercourse  is  to  tamper 
with  the  currency  of  human  intelligence.  He 
who  would  violate  the  sanctities  of  his  mother 
tongue  would  invade  the  recesses  of  the  pater- 
nal till  without  remorse,  and  repeat  the  ban- 
quet of  Saturn  without  an  indigestion." 

And,  once  more,  listen  to  the  historian. 
"The  Puritans  hated  puns.  The  Bishops  were 
notoriously  addicted  to  them.  The  Lords  Tem- 
poral carried  them  to  tha  verge  of  license.  Maj- 
esty itself  must  have  its  Royal  quibble.  'Ye 
be  burly,  my  Lord  of  Burleigh, '  said  Queen 
Elizabeth,  'but  ye  shall  make  less  stir  in  our 
realm  than  my  Lord  of  Leicester.'  The  gra- 
vest wisdom  and  the  highest  breeding  lent  their 
sanction  to  the  practice.  Lord  Bacon  playfully 
declared  himself  a  descendant  of  'Og,  the  King 
of  Bashan.  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  with  his  last 
breath,  reproached  the  soldier  who  brought  him 
water,  for  wasting  a  casque  full  upon  a  dying 
man.  A  courtier,  who  saw  Othello  performed 


1 6    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

at  the  Globe  Theater,  remarked,  that  the  black- 
amoor was  a  brute,  and  not  a  man.  'Thou  hast 
reason,'  replied  a  great  Lord,  'according  to 
Plato  his  saying;  for  this  be  a  two-legged  animal 
with  feathers.'  The  fatal  habit  became  uni- 
versal. The  language  was  corrupted.  The  in- 
fection spread  to  the  national  conscience.  Po- 
litical double-dealings  naturally  grew  out  of 
verbal  double  meanings.  The  teeth  of  the  new 
dragon  were  sown  by  the  Cadmus  who  intro- 
duced the  alphabet  of  equivocation.  What  was 
levity  in  the  time  of  the  Tudors  grew  to  regicide 
and  revolution  in  the  age  of  the  Stuarts." 

Who  was  that  boarder  that  just  whispered 
something  about  the  Macaulay-flowers  of  liter- 
ature?— There  was  a  dead  silence. — I  said 
calmly,  I  shall  henceforth  consider  any  inter- 
ruption by  a  pun  as  a  hint  to  change  my  board- 
ing-house. Do  not  plead  my  example.  If  / 
have  used  any  such,  it  has  been  only  as  a  Spar- 
tan father  would  show  up  a  drunken  helot.  We 
have  done  with  them. 

If  a  logical  mind  ever  found  out  anything 

with  its  logic? — I  should  say  that  its  most  fre- 
quent work  was  to  build  a  pons  asinorum  over 
chasms  that  shrewd  people  can  bestride  with- 
out such  a  structure.  You  can  hire  logic,  in  the 
shape  of  a  lawyer,  to  prove  anything  that  you 
want  to  prove.  You  can  buy  treatises  to  show 
that  Napoleon  never  lived,  and  that  no  battle 
of  Bunker-hill  was  ever  fought.  The  great  minds 
are  those  with  a  wide  span,  that  couple  truths 
related  to,  but  far  removed  from,  each  other. 
Logicians  carry  the  surveyor's  chain  over  the 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     17 

track  of  which  these  are  the  true  explorers.  I 
value  a  man  mainly  for  his  primary  relations 
with  truth,  as  I  understand  truth, — not  for  any 
secondary  artifice  in  handling  his  ideas.  Some 
of  the  sharpest  men  in  argument  are  notoriously 
unsound  in  judgment.  I  should  not  trust  the 
counsel  of  a  smart  debater,  any  more  than  that 
of  a  good  chess-player.  Either  may  of  course 
advise  wisely,  but  not  necessarily  because  he 
wrangles  or  plays  well. 

The  old  gentleman  who  sits  opposite  got  his 
hand  up,  as  a  pointer  lifts  his  forefoot,  at  the 
expression,  "his  relations  with  truth  as  I  under- 
stand truth,"  and  when  I  had  done,  sniffed  au- 
dibly, and  said  I  talked  like  a  transcendentalist. 
For  his  part,  common  sense  was  good  enough 
for  him. 

Precisely  so,  my  dear  sir,  I  replied;  common 
sense,  as  you  understand  it.  We  all  have  to 
assume  a  standard  of  judgment  in  our  own 
minds,  either  of  things  or  persons.  A  man  who 
is  willing  to  take  another's  opinion  has  to  ex- 
ercise his  judgment  in  the  choice  of  whom  to 
follow,  which  is  often  as  nice  a  matter  as  to 
judge  of  things  for  one's  self.  On  the  whole,  I 
had  rather  judge  men's  minds  by  comparing  their 
thoughts  with  my  own,  than  judge  of  thoughts 
by  knowing  who  utter  them.  I  must  do  one  or 
the  other.  It  does  not  follow,  of  course,  that 
I  may  not  recognize  another  man's  thoughts  as 
broader  and  deeper  than  my  own;  but  that  does 
not  necessarily  change  my  opinion,  otherwise 
this  would  be  at  the  mercy  of  every  superior 
mind  that  held  a  different  one.  How  many  of 


l8    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

our  most  cherished  beliefs  are  like  those  drink- 
ing-glasses  of  the  ancient  pattern,  that  serve  us 
well  so  long  as  we  keep  them  in  our  hand,  but 
spill  all  if  we  attempt  to  set  them  down!  I 
have  sometimes  compared  conversation  to  the 
Italian  game  of  mora,  in  which  one  player  lifts 
his  hand  with  so  many  fingers  extended,  and 
the  other  matches  or  misses  the  number,  as  the 
case  may  be  with  his  own.  I  show  my  thought, 
another  his;  if  they  agree,  well;  if  they  differ, 
we  find  the  largest  common  factor,  if  we  can, 
but  at  any  rate  avoid  disputing  about  remain- 
ders and  fractions,  which  is  to  real  talk  what 
tuning  an  instrument  is  to  playing  on  it. 

What  if, instead  of  talking  this  morning, 

I  should  read  you  a  copy  of  verses,  with  critical 
remarks  by  the  author?  Any  of  the  company 
can  retire  that  like. 

When  Eve  had  led  her  lord  away, 

And  Cain  had  killed  his  brother, 
The  stars  and  flowers,  the  poets  say, 

Agreed  with  one  another, 

To  cheat  the  cunning  tempter's  art, 

And  teach  the  race  its  duty, 
By  keeping  on  its  wicked  heart 

Their  eyes  of  light  and  beauty. 

A  million  sleepless  lids,  they  say, 

Will  be  at  least  a  warning; 
And  so  the  flowers  would  watch  by  day, 

The  stars  from  eve  to  morning. 

On  hill  and  prairie,  field  and  lawn, 

Their  dewy  eyes  upturning, 
The  flowers  still  watch  from  reddening  dawn 

Till  western  skies  are  burning. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     1 9 

Alas!  each  hour  of  daylight  tells 

A  tale  of  shame  so  crushing, 
That  some  turn  white  as  sea-bleached  shells, 

And  some  are  always  blushing. 

But  when  the  patient  stars  look  down 

On  all  their  light  discovers, 
The  traitor's  smile,   the  murderer's  frown, 

The  lips  of  lying  lovers, 

They  try  to  shut  their  saddening  eyes, 

And  in  the  vain  endeavor 
We  see  them  twinkling  in  the  skies, 

And  so  they  wink  forever. 

What  do  you  think  of  these  verses,  my 
friends? — Is  that  piece  an  impromptu?  said  my 
landlady's  daughter.  (Aet.  19  -J-.  Tender- 
eyed  blonde.  Long  ringlets.  Cameo  pin.  Gold 
pencil  case  on  a  chain.  Locket.  Bracelet. 
Album.  Autograph  book.  Accordeon.  Reads 
Byron,  Tupper,  and  Sylvanus  Cobb,  junior, 
while  her  mother  makes  the  puddings.  Says, 
"Yes?"  when  you  tell  her  anything.)  —  Out  et 
non,  ma  petite,  —  Yes  and  no,  my  child.  Five 
of  the  seven  verses  were  written  off-hand;  the 
other  two  took  a  week, — that  is,  were  hanging 
round  the  desk  in  a  ragged,  forlorn,  unrhymed 
condition  as  long  as  that.  All  poets  will  tell 
you  just  such  stories.  C ' est  le  DERNIER  pas  qui 
coute.  Don't  you  know  how  hard  it  is  for 
some  people  to  get  out  of  a  room  after  their 
visit  is  really  over?  They  want  to  be  off,  and 
you  want  to  have  them  off,  but  they  don't  know 
how  to  manage  it.  One  would  think  they  had 
been  built  in  your  parlor  or  study, and  were  wait- 
ing to  be  launched.  I  have  contrived  a  sort  of 


2O    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

ceremonial  incline  plane  for  such  visitors,  which 
being  lubricated  with  certain  smooth  phrases, 
I  back  them  down,  metaphorically  speak- 
ing, stern-foremost,  into  their  "native  element," 
the  great  ocean  of  out-doors.  Well,  now,  there 
are  poems  as  hard  to  get  rid  of  as  these  rural 
visitors.  They  come  in  glibly,  use  up  all  the 
serviceable  rhymes,  day,  ray,  beauty, duty  >  skies, 
eyes,  other,  brother,  mountain,  fountain,  and 
the  like;  and  so  they  go  on  until  you  think  it 
is  time  for  the  wind-up,  and  the  wind-up  won't 
come  on  any  terms.  So  they  lie  about  until 
you  get  sick  of  the  sight  of  them,  and  end  by 
thrusting  some  cold  scrap  of  a  final  couplet 
upon  them,  and  turning  them  out  of  doors.  I 
suspect  a  good  many  "impromptus"  could  tell 
just  such  a  story  as  the  above. — Here  turning  to 
our  landlady,  I  used  an  illustration  which 
pleased  the  company  much  at  the  time,  and 
has  since  been  highly  commended.  "Madam," 
I  said,  "you  can  pour  three  gills  and  three 
quarters  of  honey  from  that  pint  jug,  if  it  is  full, 
in  less  than  one  minute;  but,  Madam, you  could 
not  empty  that  last  quarter  of  a  gill,  though 
you  were  turned  into  a  marble  Hebe,  and  held 
the  vessel  upside  down  for  a  thousand  years." 
One  gets  tired  to  death  of  the  old,  old 
rhymes,  such  as  you  see  in  that  copy  of  verses, 
— which  I  don't  mean  to  abuse,  or  to  praise 
either.  I  always  feel  as  if  I  were  a  cobbler, 
putting  new  top-leathers  to  an  old  pair  of  boot- 
soles  and  bodies,  when  I  am  fitting  sentiments 
to  these  venerable  jingles. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    21 

,         .  youth 

.....     morning 

.  truth 

warning. 

Nine-tenths  of  the  "Juvenile  Poems"  written 
spring  out  of  the  above  musical  and  suggestive 
coincidences. 

"Yes?"  said  our  landlady's  daughter. 

I  did  not  address  the  following  remark  to  her, 
and  I  trust,  from  her  limited  range  of  reading, 
she  will  never  see  it;  I  said  it  softly  to  my  next 
neighbor. 

When  a  young  female  wears  a  flat  circular 
side-curl,  gummed  on  each  temple, — when  she 
walks  with  a  male,  not  arm  in  arm, but  his  arm 
against  the  back  of  hers, — and  when  she  says 
"Yes?"  with  the  note  of  interrogation,  you  are 
generally  safe  in  asking  her  what  wages  she  gets, 
and  who  the  "feiler"  was  you  saw  her  with. 

"What  were  you  whispering ?"said  the  daugh- 
ter of  the  house,  moistening  her  lips,  as  she 
spoke,  in  a  very  engaging  manner. 

"I  was  only  giving  some  hints  on  the  fine 
arts." 

"Yes?" 

It  is  curious  to  see  how   the  same  wants 

and  tastes  find  the  same  implements  and  modes 
of  expression  in  all  times  and  places.  The 
young  ladies  of  Otaheite,  as  you  may  see  in 
Cook's  Voyages, had  a  sort  of  crinoline  arrange- 
ment fully  equal  in  radius  to  the  largest  spread 
of  our  own  lady-baskets.  When  I  fling  a  Bay- 
State  shawl  over  my  shoulders,  I, am  only  tak- 
ing a  lesson  from  the  climate  that  the  Indian  had 


22    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

learned  before  me.  A  blanket-^b&vA  we  call  it, 
and  not  a  plaid;  and  we  wear  it  .like  the  abor- 
igines, and  not  like  the  Highlanders. 

We  are  the  Romans  of  the  modern  world, 

— the  great  assimilating  people.  Conflicts  and 
conquests  are  of  course  necessary  accidents  with 
us,  as  with  our  prototypes.  And  so  we  come 
to  their  style  of  weapon.  Our  army  sword  is 
the  short, stiff,  pointed  gladius  of  the  Romans; 
and  the  American  bowie-knife  is  the  same  tool, 
modified  to  meet  the  daily  wants  of  civil  society. 
I  announce  at  this  table  an  axiom  not  to  be 
found  in  Montesquieu  or  the  journals  of  Con- 
gress:— 

The  race  that  shortens  its  weapons  lengthens 
its  boundaries. 

Corollary.  It  was  the  Polish  lance  that  left 
Poland  at  last  with  nothing  of  her  own  to  bound. 

"Dropped  from  her  nerveless  grasp  the  shattered  spear." 

What  business  had  Sarmatia  to  be  fighting 
for  liberty  with  a  fifteen-foot  pole  between  her 
and  the  breasts  of  her  enemies?  If  she  had  but 
clutched  the  old  Roman  and  young  American 
weapon,  and  come  to  close  quarters,  there 
might  have  been  a  chance  for  her;  but  it  would 
have  spoiled  the  best  passages  in  "The  Pleas- 
ures of  Hope  " 

Self-made  men? — Well,  yes.  Of  course 

every  body  likes  and  respects  self-made  men.  It 
is  a  great  deal  better  to  be  made  in  that  way 
than  not  be  made  at  all.  Are  any  of  you  younger 
people  old  enough  to  remember  that  Irish- 
man's house  on  the  marsh  at  Cambridgeport, 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     23 

which  house  he  built  from  drain  to  chimney-top 
with  his  own  hands?  It  took  him  a  good  many 
years  to  build  it,  and  one  could  see  that  it  was 
a  little  out  of  plumb,  and  a  little  wavy  in  out- 
line, and  a  little  queer  and  uncertain  in  general 
aspect.  A  regular  hand  could  certainly  have 
built  a  better  house;  but  it  was  a  very  good 
house  for  a  "self-made"  carpenter's  house,  and 
people  praised  it,  and  said  how  remarkably  well 
the  Irishman  had  succeeded.  They  never 
thought  of  praising  the  fine  blocks  of  houses  a 
little  farther  on. 

Your  self-made  man,  whittled  into  shape 
with  his  own  jackknife,  deserves  more  credit,  if 
that  is  all,  than  the  regular  engine-turned  article, 
shaped  by  the  most  approved  pattern,  and 
French-polished  by  society  and  travel.  But  as  to 
saying  that  one  is  every  way  the  equal  of  the 
other,  that  is  another  matter.  The  right  of  strict 
social  discrimination  of  all  things  and  persons, 
according  to  their  merits,  najdye  or  acquired,  is 
one  of  the  most  precious  republican  privileges. 
I  take  the  liberty  to  exercise  it,  when  I  say, 
that,  other  things  being  equal,  in  most  relations 
of  life  I  prefer  a  man  of  family. 

What  do  I  mean  by  a  man  of  family? — O, 
I'll  give  you  a  general  idea  of  what  I  mean. 
Let  us  give  him  a  first-rate  fit  out;  it  costs  us 
nothing. 

Four  or  five  generations  of  gentlemen  and 
gentlewomen;  among  them  a  member  of  his 
Majesty's  Council  for  the  Province,  a  Governor 
or  so,  one  or  two  Doctors  of  Divinity,  a  mem- 
ber of  Congress,  not  later  than  the  time  of  top- 
boots  with  tassels. 


24    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Family  portraits.  The  member  of  the  Coun- 
cil by  Smibert,  The  great  merchant-uncle,  by 
Copley,  full  length,  sitting  in  his  arm-chair,  in  a 
velvet  cap  and  flowered  robe,  with  a  globe  by 
him,  to  show  the  range  of  his  commercial  trans- 
actions, and  letters  with  large  red  seals  lying 
around,  one  directed  conspicuously  to  The  Hon- 
orable etc. , etc.  Great-grandmother,  by  the  same 
artist;  brown  satin,  lace  very  fine,  hands  super- 
lative; grand  old  lady,  stiffish,  but  imposing. 
Her  mother,  artist  unknown;  flat,  angular,  hang- 
ing sleeves;  parrot  on  fist.  A  pair  of  Stuarts, 
viz.,  i.  A  superb  full-blown,  mediaeval  gen- 
tleman, with  a  fiery  dash  of  Tory  blood  in  his 
veins,  tempered  down  with  that  of  a  fine  old 
rebel  grandmother,  and  warmed  up  with  the 
best  of  old  India  Madeira;  his  face  is  one 
flame  of  ruddy  sunshine;  his  ruffled  shirt 
rushes  out  of  his  bosom  with  an  impetuous  gen- 
erosity, as  if  it  would  drag  his  heart  after  it; 
and  his  smile  is  good  for  twenty  thousand  dol- 
lars to  the  Hospital,  besides  ample  bequests  to 
all  relatives  and  dependants.  2.  Lady  of  the 
same;  remarkable  cap;  high  waist, as  in  time  of 
Empire;  bust  a  la  Josephine;  wisps  of  curls, 
like  celery-tips,  at  side  of  forehead;  complexion 
clear  and  warm,  like  rose  cordial.  As  for  the 
miniatures  by  Malbone,  we  don't  count  them 
in  the  gallery. 

Books,  too,  with  the  names  of  old  college- 
students  in  them,  — family  names; — you  will 
find  them  at  the  head  of  their  respective  classes 
in  the  days  when  students  took  rank  on  the 
catalogue  from  their  parents'  condition.  Elze- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     25 

virs,  with  the  Latinized  appellations  of  youthful 
progenitors,  and  Hie  liber  est  meus  on  the  title- 
page.  A  set  of  Hogarth's  original  plates.  Pope, 
original  edition,  15  volumes,  London,  1717. 
Barrow  on  the  lower  selves,  in  folio.  Tillot- 
son  on  the  upper,  in  a  little  dark  platoon  of 
octodecimos. 

Some  family  silver;  a  string  of  wedding  and 
funeral  rings;  the  arms  of  the  family  curiously 
blazoned;  the  same  in  worsted,  by  a  maiden 
aunt. 

If  the  man  of  family  has  an  old  place  to  keep 
these  things  in,  furnished  with  claw-foot  chairs 
and  black  mahogany  tables,  and  tall  bevel-edged 
mirrors,  and  stately  upright  cabinets,  his  outfit 
is  complete. 

No,  my  friends,  I  go  (aways,  other  things  being 
equal)  for  the  man  that  inherits  family  traditions 
and  the  cumulative  humanities  of  at  least  four 
or  five  generations.  Above  all  things,  as  a  child, 
he  should  have  tumbled  about  in  a  library.  All 
men  are  afraid  of  books,  that  have  not  handled 
them  from  infancy.  Do  you  suppose  our  dear 
Professor  over  there  ever  read  Poll  Synopsis,  or 
consulted  Castelli  Lexicon,  while  he  was  grow- 
ing up  to  their  stature?  Not  he;  but  virtue 
passed  through  the  hem  of  their  parchment  and 
leather  garments  whenever  he  touched  them,  as 
the  precious  drugs  sweated  through  the  bat's 
handle  in  the  Arabian  story.  I  tell  you  he  is  at 
home  wherever  he  smells  the  invigorating  fra- 
grance of  Russia  leather.  No  self-made  man 
feels  so.  One  may,  it  is  true,  have  all  the  an- 
tecedents I  have  spoken  of,  and  yet  be  a  boor 


26    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

or  a  shabby  fellow.  One  may  have  none  of 
them,  and  yet  be  fit  for  councils  and  courts. 
Then  let  them  change  places.  Our  social  arrange- 
ment has  this  great  beauty,  that  its  strata  shift 
up  and  down  as  they  change  specific  gravity, 
without  being  clogged  by  layers  of  prescription. 
But  I  still  insist  on  my  democratic  liberty  of 
choice,  and  I  go  for  the  man  with  the  gallery  of 
family  portraits  against  the  one  with  the  twenty- 
five-cent  daguerreotype,  unless  I  find  out  that 
the  last  is  the  better  of  the  two. 

1  should  have  felt  more  nervous  about  the 

late  comet,  if  I  had  thought  the  world  was  ripe. 
But  it  is  very  green  yet,  if  I  am  not  mistaken; 
and  besides,  there  is  a  great  deal  of  coal  to  use 
up,  which  I  cannot  bring  myself  to  think  was 
made  for  nothing  If  certain  things,  which 
seem  to  me  essential  to  a  millennium,  had  come 
to  pass,  I  should  have  been  frightened;  but 
they  haven't.  Perhaps  you  would  like  to  hear 
my 

LATTER-DAY  WARNINGS. 

When  legislators  keep  the  law, 

When  banks  dispense  with  bolts  and  locks, 

When  berries,  whortle — rasp — and  straw — 
Grow  bigger  downwards  through  the  box, — 

When  he  that  selleth  house  or  land 
Shows  leak  in  roof  or  flaw  in  right, — 

When  haberdashe  rs  choose  the  stand 

Whose  window  hath  the  broadest  light, — 

When  preachers  tell  us  all  they  think, 

And  party  leaders  all  they  mean, — 
When  what  we  pay  for,  that  we  drink, 

From  real  grape  and  coffee-bean, — 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    27 


When  lawyers  take  what  they  would  give, 
And  doctors  give  what  they  would  take,— 

When  city  fathers  eat  to  live, 
Save  when  they  fast  for  conscience'  sake,— 

When  one  that  hath  a  horse  on  sale 

Shall  bring  his  merit  to  the  proof, 
Without  a  lie  for  every  nail 

That  holds  the  iron  on  the  hoof, — 

When  in  the  usual  place  for  rips 

Our  gloves  are  stitched  with  special  care, 

And  guarded  well  the  whalebone  tips 
Where  first  umbrellas  need  repair, — 

When  Cuba's  weeds  have  quite  forgot 

The  power  of  suction  to  resist 
And  claret-bottles  harbor  not 

Such  dimples  as  would  hold  your  fist,- 

When  publishers  no  longer  steal 

And  pay  for  what  they  stole  before, — 

When  the  first  locomotive's  wheel 

Rolls  through  the  Hoosac  tunnel's  bore; — 

Till  then  let  Cumming  blaze  away, 
And  Miller's  saints  blow  up  the  globe; 

But  when  you  see  that  blessed  day, 
Then  order  your  ascension  robe! 

The  company  seemed  to  like  the  verses,  and 
I  promised  them  to  read  others  occasionally,  if 
they  had  a  mind  to  hear  them.  Of  course  they 
would  not  expect  it  every  morning.  Neither 
must  the  reader  suppose  that  all  these  things 
I  have  reported  were  said  at  any  one  breakfast- 
time.  I  have  not  taken  the  trouble  to  date 
them,  as  Raspail,  pere,  used  to  date  every 


28    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

proof  he  sent  to  the  printer;  but  they  were  scat- 
tered over  several  breakfasts;  and  I  have  said 
a  good  many  more  things  since,  which  I  shall 
very  possibly  print  some  time  or  other,  if  I  am 
urged  to  do  it  by  judicious  friends. 


II. 


I  really  believe  some  people  save  their  bright 
thoughts,  as  being  too  precious  for  conversation. 
What  do  you  think  an  admiring  friend  said  the 
other  day  to  one  that  was  talking  good  things, — 
good  enough  to  print?  "Why,"  said  he,  "you 
are  wasting  merchantable  literature,  a  cash  arti- 
cle, at  the  rate,  as  nearly  as  I  can  tell,  of  fifty 
dollars  an  hour."  The  talker  took  him  to  the 
window  and  asked  him  to  look  out  and  tell  what 
he  saw. 

"Nothing  but  a  very  dusty  street,"  he  said, 
"and  a  man  driving  a  sprinkling-machine 
through  it." 

"Why  don't  you  tell  the  man  he  is  wasting 
that  water?  What  would  be  the  state  of  the 
highways  of  life,  if  we  did  not  drive  our  thought- 
sprinklers  through  them  with  the  valves  open, 
sometimes? 

"Besides,  there  is  another  thing  about  this 
talking,  which  you  forget.  It  shapes  our 
thoughts  for  us; —  the  waves  of  conversation 
roll  them  as  the  surf  rolls  the  pebbles  on  the 
shore.  Let  me  modify  the  image  a  little.  I 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     29 

rough  out  my  thoughts  in  talk  as  an  artist 
models  in  clay.  Spoken  language  is  so  plas- 
tic,— you  can  pat  and  coax,  and  spread  and 
shave,  and  rub  out,  and  fill  up,  and  stick  on  so 
easily,  when  you  work  that  soft  material,  that 
there  is  nothing  like  it  for  modeling.  Out  of 
it  coma  the  shapes  which  you  turn  into  marble 
or  bronze  in  your  immortal  books,  if  you  hap- 
pen to  write  such.  Or,  to  use  another  illustra- 
tion, writing  or  printing  is  like  shooting  with  a 
rifle;  you  may  hit  your  reader's  mind,  or  miss 
it; — but  talking  is  like  playing  at  a  mark  with 
the  pipe  of  an  engine;  if  it  is  within  reach,  and 
you  have  time  enough,  you  can't  help  hitting 
it." 

The  company  agreed  that  this  last  illustra- 
tion was  of  superior  excellence,  or,  in  the  phrase 
used  by  them,  "Fust-rate."  I  acknowledged 
the  compliment,  but  gently  rebuked  the  expres- 
sion. "Fust-rate,"  "prime,"  "a  prime  article," 
"a  superior  piece  of  goods,"  "a  handsome  gar- 
ment," "a  gent  in  a  flowered  vest," — all  such 
expressions  are  final.  They  blast  the  lineage  of 
him  or  her  who  utters  them,  for  generations  up 
and  down.  There  is  one  other  phrase  which 
will  soon  come  to  be  decisive  of  a  man's  social 
status,  if  it  is  not  already:  "That  tells  the 
whole  story."  It  is  an  expression  which  vulgar 
and  conceited  people  particulary  affect,  and 
which  well-meaning  ones,  who  know  better, 
catch  from  them.  It  is  intended  to  stop  all  de- 
bate, like  the  previous  question  in  the  General 
Court.  Only  it  don't;  simply  because  "that" 
does  not  usually  tell  the  whole,  nor  one  half  of 
the  whole  story. 


3O     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

It  is  an  odd  idea, that  almost  all  our  peo- 
ple have  had  a  professional  education.  To  be- 
come a  doctor  a  man  must  study  some  three 
years  and  hear  a  thousand  lectures,  more  or 
less.  Just  how  much  study  it  takes  to  make  a 
lawyer  I  cannot  say,  but  probably  not  more 
than  this.  Now  most  decent  people  hear  one 
hundred  lectures  or  sermons  (discourses)  on  the- 
ology every  year, —  and  this, twenty,  thirty,  fifty 
years  together.  They  read  a  great  many  re- 
ligious books  besides.  The  clergy,  however, 
rarely  hear  any  sermons  except  what  they 
preach  themselves.  A  dull  preacher  might  be 
conceived,  therefore,  to  lapse  into  a  state  of 
quasi  heathenism,  simply  for  want  of  religious 
instruction.  And  on  the  other  hand,  an  atten- 
tive and  intelligent  hearer,  listening  to  a  suc- 
cession of  wise  teachers,  might  become  actually 
better  educated  in  theology  than  any  one  of 
them.  We  are  all  theological  students,  and 
more  of  us  qualified  as  doctors  of  divinity  than 
have  received  degrees  at  any  of  the  universities. 

It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  very  good 
people  should  often  find  it  difficult,  if  not  im- 
possible, to  keep  their  attention  fixed  upon  a  ser- 
mon treating  feebly  a  subject  which  they  have 
thought  vigorously  about  for  years,  and  heard 
able  men  discuss  scores  of  times.  I  have  often 
noticed,  however,  that  a  hopelessly  dull  dis- 
course acts  inductively,^  electricians  would  say, 
in  developing  strong  mental  currents.  I  am 
ashamed  to  think  with  what  accompaniments 
and  variations  and  fioriture  I  ha>e  sometimes 
followed  the  droning  of  a  heavy  speaker, — not 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    31 

willingly, — for  my  habit  is  reverential, — but  as 
a  necessary  result  of  a  slight  continuous  impres- 
sion on  the  senses  and  the  mind,  which  kept 
both  in  action  without  furnishing  the  food  they 
required  to  work  upon.  If  you  ever  saw  a  crow 
with  a  king-bird  after  him,  you  will  get  an  im- 
age of  a  dull  speaker  and  a  lively  listener.  The 
bird  in  sable  plumage  flaps  heavily  along  his 
straight-forward  course,  while  the  other  sails 
round  him,  over  him,  under  him,  leaves  him, 
comes  back  again,  tweaks  out  a  black  feather, 
shoots  away  once  more,  never  losing  sight  of 
him,  and  finally  reaches  the  crow's  perch  at  the 
same  time  the  crow  does,  having  cut  a  perfect 
labyrinth  of  loops  and  knots  and  spirals  while 
the  slow  fowl  was  painfully  working  from  one 
end  of  his  straight  line  to  the  other. 

[I  think  these  remarks  were  received  rather 
coolly.  A  temporary  boarder  from  the  country, 
consisting  of  a  somewhat  more  than  middle- 
aged  female,  with  a  parchmant  forehead  and  a 
dry  little  "frisette"  shingling  it,  a  sallow  neck 
with  a  necklace  of  gold  beads,  a  black  dress  too 
rusty  for  receat  grief,  and  contours  in  basso-ri- 
lievo,  left  the  table  prematurely,  and  was  re- 
ported to  have  been  very  virulent  about  what 
I  said.  So  I  went  to  my  good  old  minister  and 
repeated  the  remarks,  as  nearly  as  I  could  re- 
member them,  to  him.  He  laughed  good-na- 
turedly, and  said  there  was  considerable  truth 
in  them.  He  thought  he  could  tell  when  peo- 
ple's minds  were  wandering,  by  their  looks. 
In  the  earlier  years  of  his  ministry  he  had 
sometimes  noticed  this,  when  he  was  preaching; 


32    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

— very  little  of  late  years.  Sometimes,  when 
his  colleague  was  preaching,  he  observed  this 
kind  of  inattention;  but  after  all,  it  was  not  so 
very  unnatural.  I  will  say,  by  the  way,  that  it 
is  a  rule  I  have  long  followed,  to  tell  my  worst 
thoughts  to  my  minister,  and  my  best  thoughts 
to  the  young  people  I  talk  with.] 

1  want  to  make  a  literary  confession  now, 

which  I  believe  nobody  has  made  before  me. 
You  know  very  well  that  I  write  veises  some- 
times, because  I  have  read  some  of  them  at  this 
table.  (The  company  assented, — two  or  three 
of  them  in  a  resigned  sort  of  way,  as  I  thought, 
as  if  they  supposed  I  had  an  epic  in  my  pocket, 
and  was  going  to  read  half  a  dozen  books  or  so 
for  their  benefit  ) — I  continued.  Of  course  I  write 
some  lines  or  passages  which  are  better  than 
others;  some  which,  compared  with  the  others, 
might  be  called  relatively  excellent.  It  is  in 
the  nature  of  things  that  I  should  consider  these 
relatively  excellent  lines  or  passages  as  abso- 
lutely good.  So  much  must  be  pardoned  to 
humanity.  New  I  never  wrote  a  "good"  line 
in  my  life,  but  the  moment  after  it  was  written 
it  seemed  a  hundred  years  old.  Very  com- 
monly I  had  a  sudden  conviction  that  I  had 
seen  it  somewhere.  Possibly  I  may  have  some- 
times unconsciously  stolen  it,  but  I  do  not  re- 
member that  I  ever  cnce  detected  any  histori- 
cal truth  in  these  sudden  convictions  of  the  an- 
tiquity of  my  new  thought  or  phrase.  I  have 
learned  utterly  to  distrust  them,  and  never  al- 
low them  to  bully  me  out  of  a  thought  or  line. 
This  is  the  philosophy  of  it.  (Here  the  num- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  RREAKFAST-TABLE    33 

her  of  the  company  was  diminished  by  a  small 
secession.)  Any  new  formula  which  suddenly 
emerges  in  our  consciousness  has  its  roots  in 
long  trains  of  thought;  it  is  virtually  old  when 
it  first  makes  its  appearance  among  the  recog- 
nized growths  of  our  intellect.  Any  crystalline 
group  of  musical  words  has  had  a  long  and  still 
period  to  form  in.  Here  is  one  theory. 

But  there  is  a  large  law  which  perhaps  com- 
prehends these  facts.  It  is  this.  The  rapidity 
with  which  ideas  grow  old  in  our  memories  is 
in  a  direct  ratio  to  the  squares  of  their  impor- 
tance. Their  apparent  age  runs  up  miraculously, 
like  the  value  of  diamonds,  as  they  increase  in 
magnitude.  A  great  calamity,  for  instance,  is 
as  old  as  the  trilobites  an  hour  after  it  has  hap- 
pened. It  stains  backward  through  all  the 
leaves  we  have  turned  over  in  the  book  of  life, 
before  its  blot  of  tears  or  of  blood  is  dry  on  the 
page  we  are  turning.  For  this  we  seem  to  have 
lived;  it  was  foreshadowed  in  dreams  that  we 
leaped  out  of  in  the  cold  sweat  of  terror;  in 
the  "dissolving  views"  of  dark  day-visions;  all 
omens  pointed  to  it;  all  paths  led  to  it.  After 
the  tossing  half-fjrgetfulness  of  the  first  sleep 
that  follows  such  an  event,  it  comes  upon  us 
afresh,  as  a  surprise,  at  waking;  in  a  few  mo- 
ments it  is  old  again, — old  as  eternity. 

[I  wish  I  had  not  said  all  this  then  and  there. 
I  might  have  known  better.  The  pale  school- 
mistress, in  her  mourning  dress,  was  looking  at 
me,  as  I  noticed,  with  a  wild  sort  of  expres- 
sion. All  at  once  the  blood  dropped  out  of  her 
cheeks  as  the  mercury  drops  from  a  broken  ba- 


34    THE  AUTOCRAT  OK  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

rometer-tube,  and  she  melted  away  from  her 
seat  like  an  image  of  snow;  a  slungshot  could 
not  have  brought  her  down  better.  God  forgive 
me! 

After  this  little  episode,  I  continued,  to  some 
few  that  remained  balancing  tea-spoons  on  the 
edges  of  cups,  twirling  knives,  or  tilting  upon 
the  hind  legs  of  their  chairs  until  their  heads 
reached  the  wall,  where  they  left  gratuitous  ad- 
vertisements of  various  popular  cosmetics.] 

When  a  person  is  suddenly  thrust  into  any 
strange,  new  position  of  trial,  he  finds  the  place 
fits  him  as  if  he  had  been  measured  for  it.  He 
has  committed  a  great  crime,  for  instance,  and  is 
sent  to  the  State  Prison.  The  traditions,  pre- 
scriptions, limitations,  privileges,  all  the  sharp 
conditions  of  his  new  life,  stamp  themselves 
upon  his  consciousness  as  the  signet  on  hot 
wax; — a  single  pressure  is  enough.  Let  me 
strengthen  the  image  a  little.  Did  you  ever 
happen  to  see  thatrr.ost  soft-spoken  and  velvet- 
handed  steam-engine  at  the  Mint?  The  smooth 
piston  slides  backward  and  forward  as  a  lady 
might  slip  her  delicate  finger  in  and  out  of  a  ring. 
The  engine  lays  one  of  its  fingers  calmly,  but 
firmly,  upon  a  bit  of  metal;  it  is  a  coin  now, and 
will  remember  that  touch,  and  tell  a  new  race 
about  it,  when  the  date  upon  it  is  crusted  over 
with  twenty  centuries.  So  it  is  that  a  great 
silent-moving  misery  puts  a  new  stamp  on  us  in 
an  hour  or  a  moment, — as  sharp  an  impression 
as  if  it  had  taken  half  a  lifetime  to  engrave  it. 

It  is  awful  to  be  in  the  hands  of  the  whole- 
sale professional  dealers  in  misfortune;  under- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    35 

takers  and  jailers  magnetize  you  in  a  moment, 
and  you  pass  out  of  the  individual  life  you  were 
living  into  the  rhythmical  movements  of  their 
horrible  machinery.  Do  the  worst  thing  you 
can,  or  suffer  the  worst  that  can  be  thought  of, 
you  find  yourself  in  a  category  of  humanity  that 
stretches  back  as  far  as  Cain,  and  with  an  ex- 
pert at  your  elbow  that  has  studied  your  case 
all  out  beforehand,  and  is  waiting  for  you  with 
his  implements  of  hemp  or  mahogany.  I  bs- 
lieve,  if  a  man  were  to  be  burned  in  any  of  our 
cities  to-morrow  for  heresy,  there  would  be  found 
a  master  of  ceremonies  that  knew  just  how 
many  fagots  were  necessary,  and  the  be^t  way 
of  arranging  the  whole  matter. 

So  we  have  not  won  the  Goodwojd  cup; 

aucontraire,  we  were  a  "bad  fifth,"  if  not  worse 
than  that;  and  trying  it  again,  and  the  third 
time,  has  not  yet  bettered  the  matter.  Now  I 
am  as  patriotic  as  any  of  my  fellow-citizens, — 
too  patriotic  in  fact, for  I  have  got  into  hot  water 
by  loving  too  much  of  my  country;  in  short,  if 
any  man,  whose  fighting  weight  is  not  more 
than-eight  stone  four  pounds,  disputes  it,  I  am 
ready  to  discuss  the  point  with  him  I  should 
have  gloried  to  see  the  stars  and  stripes  in  front 
at  the  finish.  I  lave  my  country,  and  I  love 
horses.  Stubbs's  old  mezzotint  of  Eclipse  hang> 
over  my  desk, and  Herring's  portrait  of  Plenipo- 
tentiary,— whom  I  saw  run  at  Epsom,  — over  rny 
fireplace.  Did  I  not  elope  from  school  to  see 
Revenge,  and  Prospect,  and  Little  John,  and 
Peacemaker  run  over  the  race-course  where  now 
yon  suburban  village  flourishes, in  the  year  eight- 


36    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

een  hundred  and  ever-so-few?  Though  I 
never  owned  a  horse,  have  I  not  been  the  pro- 
prietor of  six  equine  females,  of  which  one  was 
the  prettiest  little  "Morgin"  that  ever  stepped? 
Listen,  then,  to  an  opinion  I  have  often  ex- 
pressed long  before  this  venture  of  ours  in  Eng- 
land, Horse  -racing  is  not  a  republican  insti- 
tution; \\ozsQ-trotting  is.  Only  very  rich  per- 
sons can  keep  race-horses,  and  everybody 
knows  they  are  kept  mainly  as  gambling  imple- 
ments. All  that  matter  about  blood  and  speed 
we  won't  discuss;  we  understand  all  that;  use- 
ful, very,  — of  course, — great  obligation's  to 
the  Godolphin  "Arabian,"  and  the  rest.  I  say 
racing  horses  are  essentially  gambling  imple- 
ments, as  much  as  roulette  tables.  Now  I  am 
not  preaching  at  this  moment;  I  may  read  you 
one  of  my  sermons  some  other  morning;  but  I 
maintain  that  gambling,  on  the  great  scale,  is 
not  republican.  It  belongs  to  two  phases  of 
society, — a  cankered  over-civilization,  such  as 
exists  in  rich  aristocracies,  and  the  reckless  life 
of  borderers  and  adventurers,  or  the  semi-bar- 
barism of  a  civilization  resolved  into  its  primi- 
tive elements.  Real  republicanism  is  stern 
and  severe;  its  essence  is  not  in  forms  of  govern- 
ment, but  in  the  omnipotence  of  public  opinion 
which  grows  out  of  it.  This  public  opinion  can- 
not prevent  gambling  with  dice  or  stocks,  but  it 
can  and  does  compel  it  to  keep  comparatively 
quiet.  But  horse-racing  is  the  most  public  way 
of  gambling;  and  with  all  its  immense  attrac- 
tions to  the  sense  and  the  feelings, — to  which  I 
plead  very  susceptible — the  disguise  is  too  thin 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     37 

that  covers  it,  and  everybody  knows  what  it 
means.  Its  supporters  are  the  Southern  gen- 
try,— fine  fellows,  no  doubt,  but  not  republi- 
cans exactly,  as  we  understand  the  term, — a 
few  Northern  millionaires  more  or  less  thorough- 
ly millioned,  who  do  not  represent  the  real  peo- 
ple, and  the  mob  of  sporting  men,  the  best  of 
whom  are  commonly  idlers,  and  the  worst  very 
bad  neighbors  to  have  near  one  in  a  crowd,  or  to 
meet  in  a  dark  alley.  In  England,  on  the  other 
hand,  with  its  aristocratic  institutions,  racing  is 
a  natural  growth  enough;  the  passion  for  it 
spreads  downward  through  all  classes,  from  the 
Queen  to  the  costermonger.  London  is  like  a 
shelled  corn-cob  on  the  Derby  day,  and  there 
is  not  a  clerk  who  could  raise  the  money  to  hire 
a  saddle  with  an  old  hack  under  it  that  can  sit 
down  on  his  office-stool  the  next  day  without 
wincing. 

Now  just  compare  the  racer  with  the  trotter 
for  a  moment.  The  racer  is  incidentally  useful, 
but  essentially  something  to  bet  upon,  as  much 
as  the  thimble-rigger's  "little  joker."  The  trot- 
ter is  essentially  and  daily  useful,  and  only  in- 
cidentally a  tool  for  sporting  men. 

What  better  reason  do  you  want  for  the  fact 
that  the  racer  is  most  cultivated  and  reaches 
his  greatest  perfection  in  England,  and  that  the 
trotting  horses  of  America  beat  the  world?  And 
why  should  we  have  expected  that  the  pick — 
if  it  was  the  pick— of  our  few  and  far-between 
racing  stables  should  beat  the  pick  of  England 
and  France?  Throw  over  the  fallacious  time- 
test,  and  there  was  nothing  to  show  for  it  but 


38     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

a  natural  kind  of  patriotic  feeling,  which  we  all 
have,  with  a  thoroughly  provincial  conceit, 
which  some  of  us  must  plead  guilty  to. 

We  may  beat  yet.  As  an  American,  I  hope 
we  shall.  As  a  moralist  and  occasional  ser- 
monizer,!  am  not  so  anxious  about  it.  Wherever 
the  trotting  horse  goes,  he  carries  in  his  train 
brisk  omnibuses,  lively  bakers'  carts,  and 
therefore  hot  rolls,  the  jolly  butcher's  wagon, 
the  cheerful  gig,  the  wholesome  afternoon  drive 
with  wife  and  child, — all  the  forms  of  moral  ex- 
cellence, except  truth,  which  does  not  agree 
with  any  kind  of  horse-flesh.  The  racer  brings 
with  him  gambling,  cursing,  swearing,  drinking 
the  eating  of  oysters,  and  a  distaste  for  mob- 
caps  and  the  middle-aged  virtues. 

And  by  the  way,  let  me  beg  you  not  to  call  a 
trotting  match  a  race,  and  not  to  speak  of  a 
"thoroughbred"  as  a  "blooded"  horse,  unless 
he  has  been  recently  phlebotomized.  I  consent 
to  your  saying  "blood  horse,"  if  you  like.  Also, 
if,  next  year,  we  send  out  Posterior  and  Poste- 
rioress,  the  winners  of  the  great  national  four- 
mile  race  in  7  181-2,  and  they  happen  to  get 
beaten,  pay  your  bets,  and  behave  like  men 
and  gentlemen  about  it,  if  you  know  how. 

[I  felt  a  great  deal  better  after  blowing  off 
the  ill-temper  condensed  in  the  above  paragraph. 
To  brag  little, — to  show  well, — to  crow  gently, 
if  in  luck, — to  pay  up,  to  own  up,  and  to  shut 
up,  if  beaten,  are  the  virtues  of  a  sporting  man, 
and  I  can't  say  that  I  think  we  have  shown 
them  in  any  great  perfection  of  late.] 

Apropos  of  horses.   Do  you  know  how  im- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    39 

portant  good  jockeying  is  to  authors?  Judicious 
management;  letting  the  public  see  your  animal 
just  enough,  and  not  too  much;  holding  him  up 
hard  when  the  market  is  too  full  of  him;  lettipg 
him  out  at  just  the  right  buying  intervals;  al- 
ways gently  feeling  his  mouth;  never  slacking 
and  never  jerking  the  rein; — this  is  what  I 
mean  by  jockeying. 

When  an  author  has  a  number  of  books 

out,  a  cunning  hand  will  keep  them  all  spinning, 
as  Signer  Blitz  does  his  dinner-plates;  fetching 
each  one  up,  as  it  begins  to  "wabble,"  by  an 
advertisement,  a  puff,  or  a  quotation. 

Whenever  the  extracts  from  a  living 

writer  begin  to  multiply  fast  in  the  papers,  with- 
out obvious  reasons, there  is  a  new  book  or  a  new 
edition  coming.  The  extracts  are  ground-bait. 

Literary  life  is  full  of  curious  phenomena. 

I  don't  know  that  there  is  anything  more  no- 
ticeable than  what  we  may  call  conventional 
reputations.  There  is  a  tacit  understanding  in 
every  community  of  men  of  letters  that  they 
will  not  disturb  the  popular  fallacy  respecting 
this  or  that  electro-gilded  celebrity.  There  are 
various  reasons  for  this  forbearance:  one  is  old; 
one  is  rich;  one  is  good-natured;  one  is  such  a 
favorite  with  the  pit  that  it  would  not  be  safe 
to  hiss  him  from  the  manager's  box.  The  ven- 
erable augurs  of  the  literary  or  scientific  temple 
may  smile  faintly  when  one  of  the  tribe  is  men- 
tioned; but  the  farce  is  in  general  kept  up  as 
well  as  the  Chinese  comic  scene  of  entreating 
and  imploring  a  man  to  stay  with  you,  with  the 
implied  compact  between  you  that  he  shall  by 


40   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

no  means  think  of  doing  it.  A  poor  wretch  he 
must  be  who  would  wantonly  sit  down  on  one 
of  these  bandbox  reputations.  A  Prince-Ru- 
pert's-drop,  which  is  a  tear  of  unannealed  glass, 
lasts  indefinitely,  if  you  keep  it  from  meddling 
hands;  but  break  its  tail  off,  and  it  explodes 
and  revolves  itself  into  powder.  These  celeb- 
rities I  speak  of  are  the  Prince-Rupert's-drops 
of  the  learned  and  polite  world.  See  how 
the  papers  treat  them!  What  an  array  of 
pleasant  kaleidoscopic  phrases,  that  can  be  ar- 
ranged in  ever  so  many  charming  patterns,  is 
at  their  service !  How  kind  the  "Critical  Notices" 
— where  small  authorship  comes  to  pick  up  chips 
of  praise,  fragrant,  sugary,  and  sappy — always 
are  to  them!  Well,  life  would  be  nothing  with- 
out paper-credit  and  other  fictions;  so  let  them 
pass  current.  Don't  steal  their  chips;  don't 
puncture  their  swimming-bladders;  don't  come 
down  on  their  pasteboard  boxes;  don't  break 
the  ends  of  their  brittle  and  unstable  reputations, 
you  fellows  who  all  feel  sure  that  your  names 
will  be  household  words  a  thousand  years  from 
now. 

"A  thousand  years  is  a  good  while,"  said  the 
old  gentleman  who  sits  opposite,  thoughtfully. 

Where  have  I  been  for  the  last  three  or 

four  days?  Down  at  the  Island,  deer-shoot- 
ing.— How  many  did  I  bag?  I  brought  home 
one  buck  shot. — The  Island  is  where?  No 
matter.  It  is  the  most  splendid  domain  that 
any  man  looks  upon  in  these  latitudes.  Blue 
sea  around  it,  and  running  up  into  its  heart,  so 
that  the  little  boat  slumbers  like  a  baby  in  lap, 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     4! 

while  the  tall  ships  are  stripping  naked  to  fight 
the  hurricane  outside,  and  storm-stay-sails  bang- 
ing and  flying  in  ribbons.  Trees,  in  stretches 
of  miles;  beeches,  oaks,  most  numerous;  — 
many  of  them  hung  with  moss,  looking  like 
bearded  Druids;  some  coiled  in  the  clasp  of 
huge,  dark-stemmed  grapevines.  Open  patches 
where  the  sun  gets  in  and  goes  to  sleep,  and 
the  winds  come  so  finely  sifted  that  they  are  as 
soft  as  swan's  down.  Rocks  scattered  about, — 
Stonehenge-like  monoliths.  Fresh-water  lakes; 
one  of  them,  Mary's  lake,  crystal-clear,  full  of 
flashing  pickerel  lying  under  the  lily-pads  like 
tigers  in  the  jungle.  Six  pounds  of  ditto  one 
morning  for  breakfast.  EGO  fecit. 

The  divinity-student  looked  as  if  he  would 
like  to  question  my  Latin.  No,  sir,  I  said, — 
you  need  not  trouble  yourself.  There  is  a  higher 
law  in  grammar,  not  to  be  put  down  by  An- 
drews and  Stoddard.  Then  I  went  on. 

Such  hospitality  as  that  Island  has  seen  there 
has  not  been  the  like  of  in  these  our  New  Eng- 
land sovereignties.  There  is  nothing  in  the 
shape  of  kindness  and  courtesy  that  can  make 
life  beautiful,  which  has  not  found  its  home  in 
that  ocean-principality.  It  has  welcomed  all 
who  were  worthy  of  welcome,  from  the  pale 
clergyman  who  came  to  breathe  the  sea-air 
with  its  medicinal  salt  and  iodine,  to  the  great 
statesman  who  turned  his  back  on  the  affairs  of 
empire,  and  smoothed  his  Olympian  forehead, 
and  flashed  his  white  teeth  in  merriment  over 
the  long  table,  where  his  wit  was  the  keenest 
and  his  story  the  best. 


42    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

[I  don't  believe  any  man  ever  talked  like 
that  in  this  world.  I  don't  believe  1  talked 
just  so;  but  the  fact  is,  in  reporting  one's  con- 
versation, one  cannot  help  Blair-ing  it  up  more 
or  less,  ironing  out  crumpled  paragraphs,  starch- 
ing limp  ones,  and  crimping  and  plaiting  a  little 
sometimes;  it  is  as  natural  as  prinking  at  the 
looking-glass.] 

How  can  a  man  help   writing  poetry  in 

such  a  place?  Everybody  does  write  poetry  that 
goes  there.  In  the  state  archives,  kept  in  the 
library  of  the  Lord  of  the  Isle,  are  whole  volumes 
of  unpublished  verse, — some  by  well-known 
hands,  and  others,  quite  as  good,  by  the  last 
people  you  would  think  of  as  versifiers, — men 
who  could  pension  off  all  the  genuine  poets  in 
the  country,  and  buy  ten  acres  of  Boston  com- 
mon, if  it  was  for  sale,  with  what  they  had  left. 
Of  course  I  had  to  write  my  little  copy  of  verses 
with  the  rest;  here  it  is,  if  you  will  hear  me 
read  it.  When  the  sun  is  in  the  west,  vessels 
sailing  in  an  easterly  direction  look  bright  or 
dark  to  one  who  observes  them  from  the  north 
or  south,  according  to  the  tack  they  are  sailing 
upon.  Watching  them  from  one  of  the  win- 
dows of  the  great  mansion,  I  saw  these  perpet- 
ual changes,  and  moralized  thus:  — 

As  I  look  from  the  isle,  o'er  its  billows  of  green 
To  the  billows  of  foam-crested  blue, 

Yon  bark,  that  afar  in  the  distance  is  seen, 
Half  dreaming,  my  eyes  will  pursue: 

Now  dark  in  the  shadow,  she  scatters  the  spray 
As  the  chaff  in  the  stroke  of  the  flail; 

Now  white  as  the  sea-gull,  she  flies  on  her  way, 
The  sun  gleaming  bright  on  her  sail. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    43 

Yet  her  pilot  is  thinking  of  dangers  to  shun, — 

Of  breakers  that  whiten  and  roar; 
How  little  he  cares,  if  in  shadow  or  sun 

They  see  him  that  gaze  from  the  shore! 
He  looks  to  the  beacon  that  looms  from  the  reef, 

To  the  rock  that  is  under  his  lee, 
As  he  drifts  on  the  blast,  like  a  wind-wafted  leaf, 

O'er  the  gulfs  of  the  desolate  sea. 

Thus  drifting  afar  to  the  dim-vaulted  caves 

Where  life  and  its  ventures  are  laid, 
The  dreamers  who  gaze  while  we  battle  the  waves 

May  see  us  in    sunshine  or  shade; 
Yet  true  to  our  course,  though  our  shadow  grow  dark, 

We'll  trim  our  broad  sail  as  before, 
And  stand  by  the  rudder  that  governs  the  bark, 

Nor  ask  how  we  look  from  the  shore! 

Insanity  is  often  the  logic  of  an  accurate 

mind  overtasked.  Good  mental  machinery  ought 
to  break  its  own  wheels  and  levers,  if  anything 
is  thrust  among  them  suddenly  which  tends  to 
stop  them  or  reverse  their  motion.  A  weak 
mind  does  not  accumulate  force  enough  to  hurt 
itself;  stupidity  often  saves  a  man  from  going 
mad.  We  frequently  see  persons  in  insane 
hospitals,  sent  there  in  consequence  of  what 
are  called  religious  mental  disturbances.  I 
confess  that  I  think  better  of  them  than  of  many 
who  hold  the  same  notions,  and  keep  their  wits 
and  appear  to  enjoy  life  very  well, outside  of  the 
asylums.  Any  decent  person  ought  to  go  mad, 
if  he  really  holds  such  or  such  opinions.  It  is 
very  much  to  his  discredit  in  every  point  of 
view,  if  he  does  not.  What  is  the  use  of  my 
saying  what  some  of  these  opinions  are?  Per- 


44    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

haps  more  than  one  of  you  hold  such  as  I  should 
think  ought  to  send  you  straight  over  to  Somer- 
ville,  if  you  have  any  logic  in  your  heads  or  any 
human  feeling  in  your  hearts.  Anything  that 
is  brutal,  cruel,  heathenish,  that  makes  life 
hopeless  for  the  most  of  mankind  and  perhaps 
for  entire  races,  —anything  that  assumes  the 
necessity  of  the  extermination  of  instincts  which 
were  given  to  be  regulated, — no  matter  by 
what  name  you  call  it, — no  matter  whether  a 
fakir,  or  a  monk, or  a  deacon  believes  it, — if  re- 
ceived, ought  to  produce  insanity  in  every  well- 
regulated  mind  That  condition  becomes  a 
normal  one,  under  the  circumstances.  I  am  \ 
very  much  ashamed  of  some  people  for  retain- 
ing their  reason,  when  they  know  perfectly  well 
that  if  they  were  not  the  most  stupid  or  the 
most  selfish  of  human  beings,  they  would  be- 
come noncompotes  at  once. 

[Nobody  understood  this  but  the  theological 
student  and  the  schoolmistress.  They  looked 
intelligently  at  each  other;  but  whether  they 
were  thinking  about  my  paradox  or  not,  I  am 
not  clear. — It  would  be  natural  enough.  Stran- 
ger things  have  happened.  Love  and  Death 
enter  boarding-houses  without  asking  the  price 
of  board,  or  whether  there  is  room  for  them. 
Alas,  these  young  people  are  poor  and  pallid! 
Love  sJiould  be  both  rich  and  rosy,  but  must 
be  either  rich  or  rosy.  Talk  about  military 
duty!  What  is  that  to  the  warfare  of  a  married 
maid-of-all-work,  with  the  title  of  mistress,  and 
an  American  female  constitution,  which  col- 
lapses just  in  the  middle  third  of  life,  and  comes 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    45 

out  vulcanized  India-rubber,  if  it  happen  to 
live  through  the  period  when  health  and  strength 
are  most  wanted?] 

Have  I  ever  acted  in  private  theatricals? 

Often.  I  have  played  the  part  of  the  "Poor 
Gentleman,"  before  a  great  many  audiences, — 
more,  I  trust,  than  I  shall  ever  face  again  I 
did  not  wear  a  stage-costume,  nor  a  wig,  nor 
mustaches  of  burnt  cork;  but  I  was  placarded 
and  announced  as  a  public  performer,  and  at 
the  proper  hour  I  came  forward  with  the  bal- 
let-dancer's smile  upon  my  countenance,  and 
made  my  bow  and  acted  my  part.  I  have  seen 
my  name  stuck  up  in  letters  so  big  that  I  was 
ashamed  to  show  myself  in  the  place  by  day- 
light. I  have  gone  to  a  town  with  a  sober  lit- 
erary essay  in  my  pocket,  and  seen  myself 
everywhere  announced  as  the  most  desperate  of 
buffos, — one  who  was  obliged  to  restrain  him- 
self in  the  full  exercise  of  his  powers,  from 
prudential  considerations.  I  have  been  through 
as  many  hardships  as  Ulysses,  in  the  pursuit  of 
my  histrionic  vocation.  I  have  traveled  in  cars 
until  the  conductors  all  knew  me  like  a  brother. 
I  have  run  off  the  rails,  and  stuck  all  night  in 
snow-drifts,  and  sat  behind  females  that  would 
have  the  window  open  when  one  could  not  wink 
without  his  eyelids  freezing  together.  Perhaps 
I  shall  give  you  some  of  my  experiences 
one  of  these  days; —  I  will  not  now,  for  I  have 
something  else  for  you. 

Private  theatricals,  as  I  have  figured  in  them 
in  county  lyceum-halls,  are  one  thing,  —  and 
private  theatricals,  as  they  may  be  seen  in  cer- 


46    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

tain  gilded  and  frescoed  saloons  of  our  metropo- 
lis, are  another.  Yes,  it  is  pleasant  to  see  real 
gentlemen  and  ladies,  who  do  not  think  it  nec- 
essary to  mouth,  and  rant,  and  stride, like  most 
of  our  stage  heroes  and  heroines,  in  the  char- 
acters which  show  off  their  graces  and  talents; 
most  of  all  to  see  a  fresh,  unrouged,  unspoiled, 
high-bred  young  maiden,  with  a  lithe  figure,  and 
a  pleasant  voice,  acting  in  those  love-dramas 
that  make  us  young  again  to  look  upon,  when 
real  youth  and  beauty  will  play  them  for  us. 

Of  course  I  wrote  the  prologue  I  was 

asked  to  write.  I  did  not  see  the  play,  though. 
I  knew  there  was  a  young  lady  in  it,  .and  that 
somebody  was  in  love  with  her,  and  she  was  in 
love  with  him,  and  somebody  (an  old  tutor,  I 
believe)  wanted  to  interfere,  and,  very  naturally, 
the  young  lady  was  too  sharp  for  him.  The 
play  of  course  ends  charmingly ;  there  is  a  gen- 
eral reconciliation, and  all  concerned  form  aline 
and  take  each  others'  hands,  as  people  always 
do  after  they  have  made  up  their  quarrels, — 
and  then  the  curtain  falls, — if  it  does  not  stick, 
as  it  commonly  does  at  private  theatricals,  in 
which  case  a  boy  is  detailed  to  pull  it  down, 
which  he  does,  blushing  violently. 

Now,  then,  for  my  prologue.  I  am  not  going 
to  change  my  caesuras  and  cadences  for  any- 
body; so  if  you  do  not  like  the  heroic,  or  iambic 
trimeter  brachycatalectic,  you  had  better  not 
wait  to  hear  it. 


THE  AUTOCRAT    OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE       47 
THIS  IS  IT. 

A  Prologue?     Well,  of  course  the  ladies  know; 
I  have  my  doubts.     No  matter, — here  we  go. 
What  is  a  Prologue?     Let  our  Tutor  teach: 
Pro  means  beforehand;  logos  stands  for  speech. 
'Tis  like  the  harper's  prelude  on  the  strings, 
The  prima  donna's  courtesy  ere  she  sings; — 
Prologues  in  meter  are  to  other  pros 
As  worsted  stockings  are  to  engine-hose. 

"The  world's  a  stage," — as  Shakspeare  said,  one  day; 

The  stage  a  world — was  what  he  meant  to  say 

The  outside  world's  a  blunder,  that  is  clear; 

The  real  world  that  Nature  meant  is  here. 

Here  every  foundling  finds  its  lost  mamma; 

Each  rogue,  repentant,  melts  his  stern  papa; 

Misers  relent,  the  spendthrift's  debts  are  paid, 

The  cheats  are  taken  in  the  traps  they  laid; 

One  after  one  the  troubles  all  are  past 

Till  the  fifth  act  comes  right  side  up  at  last, 

When  the  young  couple",  old  folks,  rogues,  and  all, 

Join  hands,  so  happy  at  the  curtain's  fall. 

— Here  suffering  virtue  ever  finds  relief, 

And  black-browed  ruffians  always  come  to  grief. 

— When  the  lorn  damsel,  with  a  frantic  screech, 

And  cheeks  as  hueless  as  a  brandy-peach 

Cries,  "Help,  kyind  Heaven!"  and  drops  upon  her  knees 

On  the  green — baize, — beneath  the  (canvas)  trees, — 

See  at  her  side  avenging  Valor  fly: — 

"Ha!  Villain!  Draw!  Now,  Terraitorr,  yield  or  die!" 

— When  the  poor  hero  flounders  in  despair, 

Some  dear  lost  uncle  turns  up  millionaire, — 

Clasps  the  young  scapegrace  with  paternal  joy, 

Sobs  on  his  neck,  "My  boy!  MY  BOY!!  MY  BOY!!!" 

Ours,  then,  sweet  friends,  the  real  world  to-night 
Of  love  that  conquers  in  disaster's  spite. 


48    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Ladies,  attend!     While  woful  cares  and  doubt 
Wrocg  the  soft  passion  in  the  world  without, 
Though  fortune  scowl,  though  prudence  interfere, 
One  thing  is  certain:     Love  will  triumph  here! 

Lords  of  creation,  whom  your  ladies  rule, — 

The  world's  great  masters,  when  you're  out  of  school, — 

Learn  the  brief  moral  of  our  evening's  play  : 

Man  has  his  will, — but  woman  has  her  way.' 

While  man's  dull  spirit  toils  in  smoke  and  fire, 

Woman's  swift  instinct  threads  the  electric  wire,- 

The  magic  bracelet  stretched  beneath  the  waves 

Beats  the  black  giant  with  his  score  of  slaves. 

All  earthly  powers  confess  your  sovereign  art 

But  that  one  rebel, — woman's  willful  heart. 

All  foes  you  master;  but  a  woman's  wit  % 

Lets  daylight  through  you  ere  you  know  you're  hit. 

So,  just  to  picture  what  her  art  can  do, 

Hear  an  old  story  made  as  good  as  new. 

Rudolph,  professor  of  the  headsman's  trade, 

Alike  was  famous  for  his  arm  and  blade. 

One  day  a  prisoner  Justice  had  to  kill 

Knelt  at  the  block  to  test  the  artist's  skill. 

Bare-armed,  swart-visaged,  gaunt,  and  shaggy-browed, 

Rudolph  the  headsman  rose  above  the  crowd. 

His  falchion  lightened  with  a  sudden  gleam, 

As  the  pike's  armor  flashes  in  the  stream. 

He  sheathed  his  blade;  he  turned  as  if  to  go; 

The  victim  knelt,  still  waiting  for  the  blow. 

"Why  strikest  not?     Perform  thy  murderous  act," 

The  prisoner  said.     (His  voice  was  slightly  cracked.) 

"Friend,  I  have  struck,"  the  artist  straight  replied; 

"Wait  but  one  moment,  and  yourself  decide." 

He  held  his  snuff-box, — "Now  then,  if  you  please!" 

The  prisoner  sniffed,  and,  with  a  crashing  sneeze, 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   49 

Off  his  head  tumbled, — bowled  along  the  floor, — 
Bounced  down  the  steps; — the  prisoner  said  no  more! 

Woman!  thy  falchion  is  a  glittering  eye; 
If  death  lurks  in  it,  oh,  how  sweet  to  die! 
Thou  takest  hearts  as  Rudolph  took  the  head; 
We  die  with  love,  and  never  dream  we're  dead! 

The  prologue  went  off  very  well,  as  I  hear. 
No  alterations  were  suggested  by  the  lady  to 
whom  it  was  sent,  so  far  as  I  know.  Sometimes 
people  criticise  the  poems  one  sends  them,  and 
suggest  all  sorts  of  improvements.  Who  was 
that  silly  body  that  wanted  Burns  to  alter  "  Scots 
wha  hae,"  so  as  to  lengthen  the  last  line, thus? — 

"Edward!"     Chains  and  slavery! 

Here  is  a  little  poem  I  sent  a  short  time  since 
to  a  committee  for  a  certain  celebration.  I 
understood  that  it  was  to  be  a  festive  and  con- 
vivial occasion,  and  ordered  myself  accordingly. 
It  seems  the  president  of  the  day  was  what  is 
called  a  "teetotaler."  I  received  a  note  from 
him  in  the  following  words, containing  the  copy 
subjoined,  with  the  emendations  annexed  to  it: 

"Dear  Sir, — Your  poem  gives  good  satisfac- 
tion to  the  committee.  The  sentiments  expressed 
with  reference  to  liquor  are  not,  however,  those 
generally  entertained  by  this  community.  I 
have  therefore  consulted  the  clergyman  of  this 
place,  who  has  made  some  slight  changes,  which 
he  thinks  will  remove  all  objections,  and  keep 
the  valuable  portions  of  the  poem.  Please  to 
inform  me  of  your  charge  for  said  poem.  Our 
means  are  limited,  etc.,  etc.,  etc. 

Yours  with  respect." 


5O   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Here  it  is, — with  the  slight  alterations! 
Come  I  fill  a  fresh  bumper, — for  why  should  we  go 

logwood 

While  the  aeefetf  still  reddens  our  cups  as  they  flow  I 

decoction 

Pour  out  the  rich  juices  still  bright  with  the  sun, 

dye-stuff 

•Ell  o'er  the  brimmed  crystal  the  -sfeiea  shall  run. 

half-ripened  apples 

The  purple  globed  cluetci-a  their  life-dews  have  bled; 

taste  sugar  of  lead 

How  sweet  is  the  breatb  of  the  fragranoc  they  chcd-l 

rank  poisons  vriHft!!! 

For  summer's  bet  roses  lie  bid  in  the  wiaes 

stable-boys  smoking  long-nines. 

That  were  garnered  by  maidcne  who4anghcd  through  tbo^inca 

«cowl  howl  scoff  sneer 

Then  a  emUe*  and  a  gtes,  and  a  toast,  and  a  ebee*, 

strychnine  and  whiskey,  and  ratsbane  and  beer 
For  all  feelgood  wino,  and  we've  oomc  of  it  hero 
In  cellar,  in  pantry,  in  attic,  in  hall, 

Down,  down,  with  the  tyrant  that  masters  us  all ! 
facag  'ore  tho-gsr  servant  that  laugha  for  ua  aH  I 

The  company  said  I  had  been  shabbily  treat- 
ed, and  advised  me  to  charge  the  committee 
double, — which  I  did.  But  as  I  never  got  my 
pay, I  don't  know  that  it  made  much  difference. 
I  am  a  very  particular  person  about  having  all 
I  write  printed  as  I  write  it.  I  require  to  see  a 
proof,  a  revise,  a  re-revise,  and  a  double  re- 
revise,  or  fourth-proof  rectified  impression  of 
all  my  productions,  especially  verse.  Manu- 
scripts are  such  puzzles!  Why,  I  was  reading 
some  lines  near  the  end  of  the  last  number  of 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    51 

this  journal,  when  I  came  across  one    beginning 

"The  stream  flashes  by,"— 

Now  as  no  stream  had  been  mentioned,  I  was 
perplexed  to  know  what  it  meant.  It  proved, 
on  inquiry,  to  be  only  a  mis-print  for  "dream." 
Think  of  it!  No  wonder  so  many  poets  die 
young. 

I  have  nothing  more  to  report  at  this  time, 
except  two  pieces  of  advice  I  gave  to  the  young 
women  at  table.  One  relates  to  a  vulgarism 
of  language,  which  I  grieve  to  say  is  sometimes 
heard  even  from  female  lips.  The  other  is  of 
more  serious  purport,  and  applies  to  such  as 
contemplate  a  change  of  condition, — matri- 
mony, in  fact. 

The  woman  who  calc'lates"  is  lost. 

Put  not  your  trust  in  money,  but  put 

your  money  in  trust. 


III. 


[The  "Atlantic"  obeys  the  moon,  and  its  Lu- 
NIVERSARY  has  come  around  again.  I  have  gath- 
ered up  some  hasty  notes  of  my  remarks  made 
since  the  last  high  tides,  which  I  respectfully 
submit.  Please  to  remember  this  is  talk;  just 
as  easy  and  just  as  formal  as  I  choose  to  make 
it.] 

1  never  saw  an  author  in  my  life — saving, 

perhaps,  one — that  did  not  purr  as  audibly  as 
a  full-grown  domestic  cat  (Felis  Catus,  LINN.), 
on  having  his  fur  smoothed  in  the  right  way  by 
a  skillful  hand. 


52    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

But  let  me  give  you  a  caution.  Be  very  care- 
ful how  you  tell  an  author  he  is  droll.  Ten  to 
one  he  will  hate  you;  and  if  he  does,  be  sure 
he  can  do  you  a  mischief,  and  very  probably 
will.  Say  you  cried  over  his  romance  or  his 
verses,  and  he  will  love  you  and  send  you  a  copy. 
You  can  laugh  over  that  as  much  as  you  like — 
in  private. 

Wonder  why  authors  and  actors  are 

ashamed  of  being  funny? — Why,  there  are  ob- 
vious reasons,  and  deep  philosophical  ones.  The 
clown  knows  very  well  that  the  women  are  not 
in  love  with  him,  but  with  Hamlet,  the  fellows 
in  the  black  cloak  and  plumed  hat.  Passion 
never  laughs.  The  wit  knows  that  his  place  is 
at  the  tail  of  a  procession. 

If  you  want  the  deep  underlying  reason,  I 
must  take  more  time  to  tell  it.  There  is  a  per- 
fect consciousness  in  every  form  of  wit — using 
that  term  in  its  general  sense — that  its  essence 
consists  in  a  partial  and  incomplete  view  of 
whatever  it  touches.  It  throws  a  single  ray, 
separated  from  the  rest, — red,  yellow,  blue,  or 
any  intermediate  shade, — upon  an  object;  never 
white  light;  that  is  the  province  of  wisdom. 
We  get  beautiful  effects  from  wit, — all  the  pris- 
matic colors,  — but  never  the  object  as  it  is  in 
fair  daylight.  A  pun,  which  is  a  kind  cf  wit, 
is  a  different  and  much  shallower  trick  in  men- 
tal optics;  throwing  the  shadows  of  two  objects 
so  that  one  overlies  the  other.  Poetry  uses 
the  rainbow  tints  for  special  effects,  but  always 
keeps  its  essential  object  in  the  purest  white 
light  of  truth.  — Will  you  allow  me  to  pursue 
this  subject  a  little  further? 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     53 

[They  didn't  allow  me  at  that  time,  for  some- 
body happened  to  scrape  the  floor  with  his  chair 
just  then;  which  accidental  sound,  as  all  must 
have,  noticed,  has  the  instantaneous  effect  that 
Proserpina's  cutting  the  yellow  hair  had  upon 
infelix  Dido.  It  broke  the  charm,  and  that 
breakfast  was  over.] 

— Don't  flatter  yourselves  that  friendship 
authorizes  you  to  say  disagreeable  things  to 
your  intimates.  On  the  contrary,  the  nearer 
you  come  into  relation  with  a  person,  the  more 
necessary  do  tact  and  courtesy  become.  Except 
in  cases  of  necessity,  which  are  rare,  leave  your 
friend  to  learn  unpleasant  truths  from  his  ene- 
mies; they  are  ready  enough  to  tell  them. 
Good-breeding  never  forgets  that  amour-propre 
is  universal.  When  you  read  the  story  of  the 
Archbishop  and  Gil  Bias,  you  may  laugh,  if  you 
will,  at  the  poor  old  man's  delusion;  but  don't 
forget  that  the  youth  was  the  greater  fool  of 
the  two  and  that  his  master  served  such  a  booby 
rightly  in  turning  him  out  of  doors. 

You  need  not  get  up  a  rebellion   against 

what  I  say,  if  you  find  everything  in  my  sayings 
is  not  exactly  new.  You  can't  possibly  mistake 
a  man  who  means  to  be  honest  for  a  literary 
pickpocket.  I  once  read  an  introductory  lec- 
ture that  looked  to  me  too  learned  for  its  lati- 
tude. On  examination,  I  found  all  its  erudition 
was  taken  ready-made  from  D' Israeli.  If  I  had 
been  ill-natured,  I  should  have  shown  up  the 
Professor,  who  had  once  belabored  me  in  his 
feeble  way.  But  one  can  generally  tell  these 
wholesale  thieves  easily  enough,  and  they  are  not 


54    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

worth  the  trouble  of  putting  them  in  the  pillory. 
I  doubt  the  entire  novelty  of  my  remarks  just 
made  on  telling  unpleasant  truths,  yet  I  am  not 
conscious  of  any  larceny. 

Neither  make  too  muqh  of  flaws  and  occa- 
sional overstatements.  Some  persons  seem 
to  think  that  absolute  truth,  in  the  form  of 
rigidly  stated  propositions,  is  all  that  conver- 
sation admits.  This  is  precisely  as  if  a  mu- 
sician should  insist  on  having  nothing  but 
perfect  chords  and  simple  melodies, — not 
diminished  fifths,  no  flat  sevenths,  no  flourishes, 
on  any  account.  Now  it  is  fair  to  say,  that, 
just  as  music  must  have  all  these,  so  conver- 
sation must  have  its  partial  truths,  its  embel- 
lished truths,  its  exaggerated  truths.  It  is  in  its 
higher  forms  an  artistic  product,  and  admits 
the  element  as  much  as  pictures  or  statues. 
One  man  who  is  a  little  too  literal  can  spoil  the 
talk  of  a  whole  tableful  of  men  of  esprit. — "Yes," 
you  say,  "but  who  wants  to  hear  fanciful  peo- 
ple's nonsense?  Put  the  facts  to  it,  and  then 
see  where  it  is!" — Certainly, if  a  man  is  too  fond 
of  paradox, — if  he  is  flighty  and  empty, — if,  in- 
stead of  striking  those  fifths  and  sevenths,  those 
harmonious  discords,  often  so  much  better  than 
the  twinned  octaves,  in  the  music  of  thought, — 
if,  instead  of  striking  these,  he  jangles  the 
chords,  stick  a  fact  into  him  like  a  stiletto.  But 
remember  that  talking  is  one  of  the  fine  arts, — 
the.noblest,  the  most  important,  and  the  most 
difficult, — and  that  its  fluent  harmonies  may  be 
spoiled  by  the  intrusion  of  a  single  harsh  note. 
Therefore  conversation  which  is  suggestive 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    55 

rather  than  argumentative,  which  lets  out  the 
most  of  each  talker's  results  of  thought,  is  com- 
monly the  pleasantest  and  the  most  profitable. 
It  is  not  easy,  at  the  best,  for  two  persons  talk- 
ing together  to  make  the  most  of  each  other's 
thoughts,  there  are  so  many  of  them. 

[The  company  looked  as  if  they  wanted  an 
explanation.] 

When  John  and  Thomas,  for  instance,  are 
talking  together,  it  is  natural  enough  that  among 
the  six  there  should  be  more  or  less  confusion 
and  misapprehension. 

[Our  landlady  turned  pale; — no  doubt  she 
thought  there  was  a  screw'  loose  in  my  intel- 
lects,— and  that  involved  the  probable  loss  of  a 
boarder.  A  severe-looking  person,  who  wears 
a  Spanish  cloak  and  a  sad  cheek,  fluted  by  the 
passions  of  the  melodrama,  whom  I  understand 
to  be  the  professional  ruffian  of  the  neigh- 
boring theater,  alluded,  with  a  certain  lifting  of 
the  brow,  drawing  down  of  the  corners  of  the 
mouth,  and  somewhat  rasping  voce  di  petto,  to 
Falstaff's  nine  men  in  buckram.  Everybody 
looked  up.  I  believe  the  old  gentleman  oppo- 
site was  afraid  I  should  seize  the  carving-knife; 
at  any  rate,  he  slid  it  to  one  side,  as  it  were 
carelessly.] 

I  think,  I  said,  I  can  make  it  plain  to  Ben- 
jamin Franklin  here,  that  there  are  at  least  six 
personalities  distinctly  to  be  recognized  as  tak- 
ing part  in  that  dialogue  between  John  and 
Thomas. 


56    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

f  1.  The  real  John;  known  only  to  his  Maker. 
I  2.  John's  ideal  John;  never   the   real   one,  and 
Three  Johns,  -j        often  very  unlike  him. 

3.  Thomas's  ideal  John;  never  the  real  John. nor 
[       John's  John,  but  often  very  unlike  either. 

(  1.  The  real  Thomas. 

Three  Thomases. -|  2.   Thomas's  ideal  Thomas. 
(  3.   John's  ideal  Thomas. 

Only  one  of  the  three  Johns  is  taxed;  only 
one  can  be  weighed  on  a  platform-balance;  but 
the  other  two  are  just  as  important  in  the  con- 
versation. Let  us  suppose  the  real  John  to  be 
old,  dull,  and  ill-looking.  But  as  the  Higher 
Powers  have  not  conferred  on  men  the  gift  of 
seeing  themselves  in  the  true  light,  John  very 
possibly  conceives  himself  to  be  youthful,  witty, 
and  fascinating,  and  talks  from  the  point  of 
view  of  this  ideal.  Thomas,  again,  believes 
him  to  be  an  artful  rogue,  we  will  say;  there- 
fore he  is  so  far  as  Thomas's  attitude  in  the  con- 
versation is  concerned,  an  artful  rogue,  though 
really  simple  and  stupid.  The  same  conditions 
apply  to  the  three  Thomases.  It  follows,  that, 
until  a  man  can  be  found  who  knows  himself  as 
his  Maker  knows  him,  or  who  sees  himself  as 
others  see  him,  there  must  be  at  least  six  per- 
sons engaged  in  every  dialogue  between  two. 
Of  these,  the  least  important,  philosophically 
speaking,  is  the  one  that  we  have  called  the 
real  person.  No  wonder  two  disputants  often 
get  angry,  when  there  are  six  of  them  talking 
and  listening  all  at  the  same  time. 

[A  very  unphilosophical  application  of  the 
above  remarks  was  made  by  a  young  fellow, 
answering  to  the  name  of  John,  who  sits  near 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     57 

me  at  table.  A  certain  basket  of  peaches,  a 
rare  vegetable,  little  known  to  boarding-houses, 
was  on  its  way  to  me  via  this  unlettered  Johan- 
nes. He  appropriated  the  three  that  remained 
in  the  basket,  remarking  that  there  was  just 
one  a  piece  for  him.  I  convinced  him  that  his 
practical  inference  was  hasty  and  illogical,  but 
in  the  meantime  he  had  eaten  the  peaches.] 

The  opinions    of    relatives  as  to  a  man's 

powers  are  very  commonly  of  little  value;  not 
merely  because  they  overrate  their  own  flesh  and 
blood,  as  some  may  suppose;  on  the  contrary, 
they  are  quite  as  likely  to  underrate  those  whom 
they  have  grown  into  the  habit  of  considering 
like  themselves.  The  advent  of  genius  is  like 
what  florists  style  the  breaking  of  a  seedling  tu- 
lip into  what  we  may  call  high-caste  colors, — 
ten  thousand  dingy  flowers,  then  one  with  the 
divine  streak;  or.if  you  prafer  it,  like  the  coming 
up  in  old  Jacob's  garden  of  that  most  gentle- 
manly little  fruit,  the  seckel  pear,  which  I  have 
sometimes  seen  in  shop  windows  It  is  a  sur- 
prise,— there  is  nothing  to  account  for  it.  All 
at  once  we  find  that  twice  two  make^zv.  Na- 
ture is  fond  of  what  are  called  "gift-enterprises." 
This  little  book  of  life  which  she  has  given  into 
the  hands  of  its  joint  possessors  is  commonly 
one  of  the  old  story-books  bound  over  again. 
Only  once  in  a  great  while  there  is  a  stately 
poem  in  it,  or  its  leaves  are  illuminated  with 
the  glories  of  art,  or  they  enfold  a  draft  for  un- 
told values  signed  by  the  millionfold  millionaire 
old  mother  herself.  But  strangers  are  com- 
monly the  first  to  find  the  "gift"'  that  came  with 
the  little  book. 


58         THE   AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

It  may  be  questioned  whether  anything  can 
be  conscious  of  its  own  flavor.  Whether  the 
musk-deer,  or  the  civet-cat,  or  even  a  still  more 
eloquently  silent  animal  that  might  be  men- 
tioned, is  aware  of  any  personal  peculiarity, 
may  well  be  doubted.  No  man  knows  his  own 
voice;  many  men  do  not  know  their  own  pro- 
files. Every  one  remembers  Carlyle's  famous 
"Characteristics"article;  allow  for  exaggerations, 
and  there  is  a  great  deal  in  his  doctrine  of  the 
self-unconsciousness  of  genius.  It  comes  under 
the  great  law  just  stated.  This  incapacity  of 
knowing  its  own  traits  is  often  jound  in  the 
Tamity  as  well"  as  irr  the  ititftviguaX  So  never 
mind  what  your  cousins,  brothers,  sisters,  un- 
cles, aunts,  and  the  rest,  say  about  that  fine 
poem  you  have  written, but  send  it  (postage  paid) 
to  the  editors,  if  there  are  any,  of  the  "Atlan- 
tic,"—  which,  by  the  way,  is  not  so  called  be- 
cause it  is  a  notion,  as  some  dull  wits  wish  they 
had  said,  but  are  too  late. 

Scientific  knowledge,  even  in  the  most 

modest  persons,  has  mingled  with  it  a  something 
which  partakes  of  insolence.  Absolute,  peremp- 
tory§facts  are  bullies,  and  those  who  keep  com- 
pany with  them  are  apt  to  get  a  bullying  habit 
of  mind; — not  of  manners,  perhaps;  they  may 
be  soft  and  smooth,  but  the  smile  they  carry  has 
a  quiet  assertion  in  it,  such  as  the  Champion 
of  the  Heavy  Weights,  commonly  the  best  na- 
tured,  but  not  the  most  diffident  of  men,  wears 
upon  what  he  very  inelegantly  calls  his  "mug." 
Take  the  man,  for  instance,  who  deals  in  the 
mathematical  sciences.  There  is  no  elasticity 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     59 

in  a  mathematical  fact;  if  you  bring  up  against 
it,  it  never  yields  a  hair's  breadth;  everything 
must  go  to  pieces  that  comes  in  collision  with  it. 
What  the  mathematician  knows  being  absolute, 
unconditional,  incapable  of  suffering  question, 
it  should  tend,  in  the  nature  of  things,  to  breed 
a  despotic  way  of  thinking.  So  of  those  who 
deal  with  the  palpable  and  often  unmistakable 
facts  of  external  nature;  only  in  a  less  degree. 
Every  probability — and  most  of  our  common, 
working  beliefs  are  probabilities — is  provided 
with  buffers  at  both  ends,  which  break  the  force 
of  opposite  opinions  clashing  against  it;  but 
scientific  certainty  has  no  spring  in  it,  no  cour- 
tesy, no  possibility  of  yielding.  All  this  must 
react  on  the  minds  that  handle  these  forms  of 
truth. 

Oh,  you  need  not  tell  me  that  Messrs.  A. 

and  B.  are  the  most  gracious,  unassuming  peo- 
ple in  the  world,  and  yet  preeminent  in  the 
ranges  of  science  I  am  referring  to.  I  know 
that  as  well  as  you.  But  mark  this  which  I  am 
going  to  say  once  for  all:  If  I  had  not  force 
enough  to  project  a  principle  full  in  the  face  of 
the  half  dozen  most  obvious  facts  which  seem 
to  contradict  it,  I  would  think  only  in  single 
file  from  this  day  forward.  A  rash  man,  once 
visiting  a  certain  noted  institution  at  South 
Boston,  ventured  to  express  the  sentiment,  that 
man  is  a  rational  being.  An  old  woman  who 
was  an  attendant  in  the  Idiot  School  contra- 
dicted the  statement,  and  appealed  to  the  facts 
before  the  speaker  to  disprove  it.  The  rash 
man  stuck  to  his  hasty  generalization,  notwith- 
standing. 


60     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BKEAKFAST-TABLE 

[ It  is  my  desire  to  be  useful  to  those  with 

whom  I  am  associated  in  my  daily  relations.  I 
not  unfrequently  practice  the  divine  art  of  music 
in  company  with  our  landlady's  daughter,  who, 
as  I  mentioned  before,  is  the  owner  of  an  ac- 
cordion. Having  myself  a  well-marked  baritone 
voice  of  more  than  half  an  octave  in  compass, 
I  sometimes  add  my  vocal  powers  to  her  exe- 
cution of 

"Thou,  thou  reign'st  in  this  bosom." — 

not,  however,  unless  her  mother  or  some  other 
discreet  female  is  present,  to  prevent  misinter- 
pretation or  remark.  I  have  also  taken  a  good 
deal  of  interest  in  Benjamin  Franklin,  before 
referred  to,  sometimes  called  B.  F.,or  more  fre- 
quently Frank,  in  imitation  of  that  felicitous  ab- 
breviation, combining  dignity  and  convenience, 
adopted  by  some  of  his  betters.  My  acquaint- 
ance with  the  French  language  is  very  imper- 
fect, I  having  never  studied  it  anywhere  but  in 
Paris,  which  is  awkward,  as  B.  F.  devotes 
himself  to  it  with  the  peculiar  advantage  of  an 
Alsacian  teacher.  The  boy,  I  think,  is  doing 
well,  between  us,  notwithstanding.  The  follow- 
ing is  an  uncorrected  French  exercise,  written 
by  this  young  gentleman.  His  mother  thinks 
it  very  creditable  to  his  abilities;  though,  being 
unacquainted  with  the  French  language,  her 
judgment  cannot  be  considered  final. 

LE  RAT  DES  SALONS  A  LECTURE. 

CE  rat  QI  est  un  animal  fort  singulier.  II  a  deux  pattes  de 
derriere  sur  lesquelles  il  marche,  et  deux  pattes  de  devant 
dont  il  fait  usage  pour  tenir  les  journaux.  Cet  animal  a  le 
peau  noir  pour  le  plupart,  et  porte  un  cercle  blanchatre  autour 
de  son  cou.  On  le  trouve  tous  les  jours  aux  dits  salons,  ou  il 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    6l 

demeure,  digere,  s'il  y  a  de  quoi  dans  son  interieur,  respire, 
tousse,  eternue,  dort,  et  ronfle  quelquefois,  ayant  toujours  le 
semblance  de  lire.  On  ne  sait  pas  s'il  a  une  autre  gite  que 
9ela.  II  a  1'air  d'une  bete  tres  stupide,  mais  il  est  d'une 
sagacite  et  d'une  vitesse  extraordinaire  quand  il  s'agit  de 
saisir  un  journal  nouveau.  On  ne  sait  pourquoi  il  lit,  par- 
cequ'il  ne  parait  pas  avoir  des  idees.  II  vocalise  rarement, 
mais  en  revanche,  il  fait  des  bruits  nasaux  divers.  II  porte 
un  crayon  dans  une  de  ses  poches  pectorales,  avec  lequel  il  fait 
des  marques  sur  les  bords  des  journaux  et  des  livres,  semblable 
aux  suivans:  !  !  ! — Bah!  Pooh!  II  ne  faut  pas  cependant  les 
prendre  pour  des  signes  d' intelligence.  II  ne  vole  pas,  ordi- 
nairement;  il  fait  rarement  meme  des  echanges  de  parapluie, 
et  jamais  de  chapeau,  parceque  son  chapeau  a  toujours  un 
caractere  specifique.  On  ne  sait  pas  au  juste  ce  dont  il  se 
nourrit.  Feu  Cuvier  etait  d'avis  que  e'etait  de  1'odeur  du 
cuir  des  reliures;  ce  qu'on  dit  d'etre  une  nourriture  animale 
fort  saine,  et  peu  chere.  II  vit  bien  longtems.  Enfin  il  meure, 
en  laissant  a  ses  heritiers  une  carte  du  Salon  a  Lecture  ou  il 
avail  existe  pendant  sa  vie.  On  pretend  qu'il  revient  toutes 
les  nuits,  apres  la  mort,  visiter  le  Salon.  On  peut  le  voir,  dit 
on,  a  minuit,  dans  sa  place  habituelle,  tenant  le  journal  du 
soir,  et  ayant  a  sa  main  un  crayon  de  char bon.  Le  lendemain 
on  trouve  des  caracteres  inconnus  sur  les  bords  du  journal.  Ce 
qui  prouve  que  le  spiritualisme  est  vrai,  et  que  Messieurs  les 
Professeurs  de  Cambridge  sonc  des  imbeciles  qui  ne  savent 
rien  du  tout,  du  tout. 

I  think  this  exercise,  which  I  have  not  cor- 
rected, or  allowed  to  be  touched  in  any  way,  is 
very  creditable  to  B.  F.  You  observe  that  he 
is  acquiring  a  knowledge  of  zoology  at  the  same 
time  that  he  is  learning  French.  Fathers  of 
families  who  take  this  periodical  will  find  it 
profitable  to  their  children,  and  an  economical 
mode  of  instruction,  to  set  them  to  revising  and 
amending  this  boy's  exercise.  The  passage  was 


62    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

originally  taken  from  the  "Historic  Naturelle 
des  Betes  Ruminans  et  Rongeurs,  Bipedes  et 
Autres,"  lately  published  in  Paris.  This  was 
translated  into  English  and  published  in 
London.  It  was  republished  at  Great  Ped- 
lington,  with  notes  and  additions  by  the 
American  editor.  The  notes  consist  of  an 
interro'gation-mark  on  page  53d,  and  a 
reference  (p.  12/th)  to  another  bock  "edited" 
by  the  same  hand.  The  additions  consist 
of  the  editor's  name  on  the  title-page  and 
back,  with  a  complete  and  authentic  list  of 
said  editor's  honorary  titles  in  the  first  of  these 
localities.  Our  boy  translated  the  translation 
back  into  French.  This  may  be  compared  with 
the  original,  to  be  found  on  Shelf  13,  Division 
X,  of  the  Public  Library  of  this  metropolis. ] 

Some  of  you  boarders  ask  me  from  time  to 

time  why  I  don't  write  a  story,  or  a  novel,  or 
something  of  that  kind.  Instead  of  answering 
each  one  of  you  separately,  I  will  thank  you  to 
step  up  into  the  wholesale  department  for  a 
few  moments,  where  I  deal  in  answers  by  the 
piece  and  by  the  bale. 

That  every  articulately-speaking    human  be- 
ing has  in  him  stuff  for  one  novel  in  three    vol- 
umes duodecimo  has  long  been  with  me  a  cher- 
ished belief.      It    has  been  maintained,  on    the\ 
other  hand,  that  many    persons    can  .not  write  \ 
more  than  one  novel, —  that  all  after    that    are 
likely    to    be    failures. — Life  is  so    much'  more  * 
tremendous  a  thing    in    its    heights  and    depths 
than  any  transcript  of  it  can  be,  that  all  records 
of  human  experience  are  as  so  many  bound  her- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     63 

baria  to  the  innumerable  glowing,  glistening, 
rustling,  breathing,  fragrance-laden,  poison-suck- 
ing, life-giving,  death-distilling  leaves  and  flow- 
ers of  the  forest  and  the  prairies.  All  we  can 
do  with  books  of  human  experience  is  to  make 
them  alive  again  with  something  borrowed  from 
our  own  lives.  We  can  make  a  book  alive  for 
us  just  in  proportion  to  its  resemblance  in  es- 
sence or  in  form  to  our  own  experience.  Now 
an  author's  first  novel  is  naturally  drawn,  to  a 
great  extent,  from  his  personal  experiences; 
that  is,  is  a  literal  copy  of  nature  under  various 
slight  disguises.  But  the  moment  the  author 
gets  out  of  his  personality,  he  must  have  the 
creative  power,  as  well  as  the  narrative  art  and 
the  sentiment,  in  order  to  tell  a  living  story; 
and  this  is  rare. 

Besides,  there  is  great  danger  that  a  man's 
first  life  story  shall  clean  him  out,  so  to  speak, 
of  his  best  thoughts.  Most  lives,  though  their 
stream  is  loaded  with  sand  and  turbid  with  al- 
luvial waste,  drop  a  few  golden  grains  of  wis- 
dom as  they  flow  along.  Oftentimes  a  single 
cradling  gets  them  all,  and  after  that  the  poor 
man's  labor  is  only  rewarded  by  mud  and  worn 
pebbles.  All  which  proves  that  I,  as  an  indi- . 
vidual  of  the  human  family,  could  write  one 
novel  or  story  at  any  rate,  if  I  would. 

.Why  don't  I,  then?— Well, there  are  sev- 
eral reasons  against  it.  In  the  first  place,  I 
should  tell  all  my  secrets,  and  I  maintain  that 
verse  is  the  proper  medium  for  such  re velatio  ns. 
Rhythm  and  rhyme  and  the  harmonies  of  music- 
al language,  the  play  of  fancy,  the  fire  of 


64    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

imagination  the  flashes  of  passion,  so  hide  the 
nakedness  of  a  heart  laid  open,  that  hardly  any 
confession,  transfigured  in  the  luminous  halo  of 
poetry,  is  reproached  as  self-exposure.  A 
beauty  shows  herself  under  the  chandeliers,  pro- 
tected by  the  glitter  of  her  diamonds,  with  such 
a  broad  snowdrift  of  white  arms  and  shoulders 
laid  bare,  that,  were  she  unadorned  and  in  plain 
calico, s  he  would  be  unendurable — in  the  opinion 
of  the  ladies. 

Again,  I  am  terribly  afraid  I  should  show  up 
all  my  friends.  I  should  like  to  know  if  all  story- 
tellers do  not  do  this?  Now  I  am  afraid  all 
my  friends  would  not  bear  showing  up  very 
well;  for  they  have  an  average  share  of  the 
common  weakness  of  humanity,  which  I  am 
pretty  certain  would  come  out.  Of  all  that 
have  told  stories  among  us  there  is  hardly  one 
I  can  recall  that  has  not  drawn  too  faithfully 
some  living  portrait  that  might  better  have  been 
spared. 

Once  more,  I  have  sometimes  thought  it  pos- 
sible I  might  be  too  dull  to  write  such  a  story 
as  I  should  wish  to  write. 

And  finally,  I  think  it  very  likely  I  shall  write 
a  story  one  of  these  days.  Don't  be  surprised 
at  any  time,  if  you  see  me  coming  out  with  "The 
Schoolmistress,"  or  "The  Old  Gentleman  Op- 
posite." \Oiir  schoolmistress  and  our  old  gen- 
tleman that  sits  opposite  had  left  the  table  be- 
fore I  said  this.]  I  want  my  glory  for  writing 
the  same  discounted'now,  on  the  spot,  if  you 
please.  I  will  write  when  I  get  ready.  How 
many  people  live  on  the  reputation  of  the  repu- 
tation they  might  have  made! 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    65 

1  saw  you  smiled  when  I  spoke  about  the 

possibility  of  my  being  too  dull  to  write  a  good 
story.  I  don't  pretend  to  know  what  you  meant 
by  it,  but  I  take  occasion  to  make  a  remark  that 
may  hereafter  prove  of  value  to  some  among 
you. — When  one  of  us  who  has  been  led  by  na- 
tive vanity  or  senseless  flattery  to  think  himself 
or  herself  possessed  of  talent  arrives  at  the  full 
and  final  conclusion  that  he  or  she  is  really  dull, 
it  is  one  of  the  most  tranquilizing  and  blessed 
convictions  that  can  enter  a  mortal's  mind.  All 
our  failures,  our  shortcomings,  our  strange  dis- 
appointments in  the  effect  of  our  efforts  are  lifted 
from  our  bruised  shoulders,  and  fall,  like  Chris- 
tian's pack,  at  the  feet  of  that  Omnipotence 
which  has  seen  fit  to  deny  us  the  pleasant  gift 
of  high  intelligence, — with  which  one  look  may 
overflow  us  in  some  wider  sphere  of  being. 

How  sweetly  and  honestly  one  said  to  me 

the  other  day,  "I  hate  books!"  A  gentleman, — 
singularly  free  from  affectations,  —  not  learned, 
of  course,  but  of  perfect  breeding,  which  is  often 
so  much  better  than  learning, — by  no  means 
dull,  in  the  sense  of  knowledge  of  the  world  and 
society,  but  certainly  not  clever  either  in  the 
arts  or  sciences,—  his  company  is  pleasing  to  all 
who  know  him.  I  did  not  recognize  in  him  in- 
feriority of  literary  tastes  half  so  distinctly  as  I 
did  simplicity  of  character  and  fearless  acknowl- 
edgment of  his  inaptitude  for  scholarship.  In 
fact,  I  think  there  are  a  great  many  gentlemen 
and  others,  who  read  with  a  mark  to  keep  their 
place,  that  really  "hate  books, "but  never  had  the 
wit  to  find  it  out  or  the  manliness  to  own  it. 
\Entre  nous,  I  always  read  with  a  mark.] 


66   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

We  get  into  a  way  of  thinking  as  if  what  we 
call  an  "intellectual  man"  was,  as  a  matter  of 
course,  made  up  of  nine-tenths,  or  thereabouts, 
of  book-learning,  and  one-tenth  himself.  But 
even  if  he  is  actually  so  compounded,  he  need 
not  read  much.  Society  is  a  strong  solution  of 
books.  It  draws  the  virtue  out  of  what  is  best 
worth  reading,  as  hot  water  draws  the  strength 
of  tea-leaves,  If  I  were  a  prince,  I  would  hire 
or  buy  a  private  or  literary  teapot,  in  which  I 
would  steep  all  the  leaves  of  new  books  that 
promised  well.  The  infusion  would  do  for  me 
without  the  vegetable  fiber.  You  understand 
me;  I  would  have  a  person  whose  sole  business 
should  be  to  read  day  and  night,  and  talk  to  me 
whenever  I  wanted  him  to.  I  know  the  man 
I  would  have:  a  quick-witted,  out-spoken,  in- 
cisive fellow;  knows  history,  or  at  any  rate  has 
a  shelf  full  of  books  about  it,  which  he  can  use 
handily,  and  the  same  of  all  useful  arts  and 
sciences;  knows  all  the  common  plots  of  plays 
and  novels,  and  the  stock  company  of  characters 
that  are  continually  coming  on  in  new  costume; 
can  give  you  a  criticism  of  an  octavo  in  an  epithet 
and  a  wink, and  you  can  depend  on  it;  cares  for 
nobody  except  for  the  virtue  there  is  in  what  he 
says;  delights  in  taking  off  big  wigs  and  pro- 
fessional gowns,  and  in  the  disembalming  and 
unbandaging  of  all  literary  mummies.  Yet  he 
is  as  tender  and  reverential  to  all  that  bears  the 
mark  of  genius, — that  is,  of  a  new  influx  of  truth 
or  beauty, — as  a  nun  over  her  missal.  In  short, 
he  is  one  of  those  men  that  know  everything 
except  how  to  make  a  living.  Him  would  I 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABtE    67 

keep  on  the  square  next  my  own  royal  compart- 
ment on  life's  chessboard.  To  him  I  would  push 
up  another  pawn,  in  the  shape  of  a  comely  and 
wise  young  woman,  whom  he  would  of  course 
take— to  wife.  For  all  contingencies  I  would 
liberally  provide.  In  a  word,  I  would,  in  the 
plebeian,  but  expressive  phrase,  "put  him 
through"  all  the  material  part  of  life;  see  him 
sheltered,  warmed,  fed,  button-mended,  and  all 
that,  just  to  be  able  to  lay  on  his  talk  when  I 
liked, — with  the  privilege  of  shutting  it  off  at 
will. 

A  Club  is  the  next  best  thing  to  this,strung  like 
a  harp,  with  a  about  dozen  ringing  intelligences, 
each  answering  to  some  chord  of  the  macrocosm. 
They  do  well  to  dine  together  once  in  a  while. 
A  dinner-party  made  up  of  such  elements  is  the 
last  triumph  of  civilization  over  barbarism. 
Nature  and  art  combine  to  charm  the  senses; 
the  equatorial  zone  of  the  system  is  soothed  by 
well-studied  artifices,  the  faculties  are  off  duty, 
and  fall  into  their  natural  attitudes;  you  see 
wisdom  in  slippers  and  science  in  a  short  jacket. 

The  whole  force  of  conversation  depends  on 
how  much  you  can  take  for  granted.  Vulgar 
chess-players  have  to  play  their  game  out;  noth- 
ing short  of  the  brutality  of  an  actual  checkmate 
satisfies  their  dull  apprehensions.  But  look  at 
two  masters  of  that  noble  game!  White  stands 
well  enough,  so  far  as  you  can  see;  but  Red 
says,  Mate  in  six  moves; — White  looks, — nods; 
— the  game  is  over.  Just  so  in  talking  with 
first-rate  men;  especially  when  they  are  good- 
natured  and  expansive,  as  they  are  apt  to  be  at 


68    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

table.  That  blessed  clairvoyance  which  sees  into 
things  without  opening  them, — that  glorious 
license,  which,  having  shut  the  do^r  and  driven 
the  reporter  from  its  keyhole,  calls  upon  Truth, 
majestic  virgin!  to  get  off  from  her  pedestal  and 
drop  her  academic  poses  and  take  a  festive  gar- 
land and  the  vacant  place  on  \.\\eincdius  lectus, — 
that  carnival-shower  of  questions  and  replies  and 
comments,  large  axioms  bowled  over  the  mahog- 
any like  bomb-shells  from  professional  mortars, 
and  explosive  wit  dropping  its  trains  of  many- 
colored  fire,  and  the  mischief-making  rain  of 
bon-bons  pelting  everybody  that  shows  himself, 
—  the  picture  of  a  truly  intellectual  banquet  is 
one  that  the  old  Divinities  might  well  have  at- 
tempted to  reproduce  in  their 

"Oh,  oh,  oh!"  cried  the  young  fellow 

whom  they  call  John, — "that  is  from  one  of 
your  lectures!" 

I  know  it,  I  replied, — I  concede  it,  I  confess 
it,  I  proclaim  it. 

"The  trail  of  the  serpent  is  over  them  all!" 

All  lecturers,  all  professors,  all  schoolmasters, 
have  ruts  and  grooves  in  their  minds  into  which 
their  conversation  is  perpetually  sliding.  Did 
you  never,  in  riding  through  the  woods  of  a  still 
June  evening,  suddenly  feel  that  you  had  passed 
into  a  warm  stratum  of  air,  and  in  a  minute  or 
two  strike  the  chill  layer  of  atmosphere  beyond? 
Did  you  never,  in  cleaving  the  green  waters  of 
the  Back  Bay, — where  the  Provincial  blue-noses 
are  in  the  habit  of  beating  the  "Metropolitan" 
boat-clubs,  —  find  yourself  in  a  tepid  streak,  a 
narrow,  local  gulf-stream,  a  gratuitous  warm- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    69 

bath  a  little  underdone,  through  which  your 
glistening  shoulders  soon  flashed,  to  bring  you 
back  to  the  cold  realities  of  a  full-sea  tempera- 
ture? Just  so,  in  talking  with  any  of  the  char- 
acters above  referred  to,  one  not  unfrequently 
finds  a  sudden  change  in  the  style  of  the  conver- 
sation. The  lack-luster  eye,  rayless  as  a  Bsacon- 
Street  door-plate  in  August,  all  at  once  fills  with 
light;  the  face  flings  itself  wide  open  like  the 
church-portals  when  the  bride  and  bridegroom 
enter;  the  little  man  grows  in  stature  before 
your  eyes,  like  the  small  prisoner  with  hair  on 
end,  beloved  yet  dreaded  of  early  childhood;  you 
were  talking  with  a  dwarf  and  imbecile, — you 
have  a  giant  and  a  trumpet-tongued  angel  be- 
fore you! Nothing  but  a  streak  out  of  a  fifty- 
dollar  lecture. As  when,  at  some  unlocked 

for  moment, the  mighty  fountain-column  springs 
into  the  air  before  the  astonished  passer-by, — 
sil  ver-footed,  diamond-crowned,  rainbow-scarfed 
— from  the  bosom  of  that  fair  sheet,  sacred  to 
the  hymns  of  quiet  batrachians  at  home,  and 
the  epigrams  of  a  less  amiable  and  less  elevated 
order  of  reptilia  in  other  latitudes. 

Who  was  that  person  that  was  so  abused 

some  time  since  for  saying  that  in  the  conflict 
of  two  races  our  sympathies  naturally  go  with 
the  higher?  No  matter  who  he  was.  Now  look 
at  what  is  going  on  in  India, — a  white,  superior 
"Caucasian"  race,  against  a  dark-skinned,  in- 
ferior, but  still  "Caucasian"  race, — and  where 
are  English  and  American  sympathies?  We 
can't  stop  to  settle  all  the  doubtful  questions; 
all  we  know  is,  that  the  brute  nature  is  sure  to 


7O    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

come  out  most  strongly  in  the  lower  race,  and 
it  is  the  general  law  that  the  human  side  of  hu- 
manity should  treat  the  brutal  side  as  it  does 
the  same  nature  in  the  inferior  animals, — tame 
it  or  crush  it.  The  India  mail  brings  stories  of 
women  and  children  outraged  and  murdered; 
the  royal  stronghold  is  in  the  hands  of  the  babe- 
killers.  England  takes  down  the  Map  of  the 
World,  which  she  has  girdled  with  empire,  and 
makes  a  correction  thus:  DELHI.  Dele.  The 
civilized  world  says,  Amen. 

Do  not  think,  because  I  talk    to    you    of 

many  subjects  briefly,  that  I  should  not  find  it 
much  lazier  work  to  take  each  one  of  them  and 
dilute  it  down  to  an  essay.  Borrow  some  of  my 
old  college  themes  and  water  my  remarks  to  suit 
yourselves,  as  the  Homeric  heroes  did  with  their 
melas oinos, — that  black,  sweet, syrupy  wine  (?) 
which  they  used  to  alloy  with  three  parts  or  more 
of  the  flowing  stream.  [Could  it  have  been  me- 
lasses,  as  Webster  and  his  provincials  spell  it, — 
or  Mo/ossa's,  as  dear  old  smattering, chattering, 
would-be-College-President,  Cotton  Mather,  has 
it  in  the  "Magnalia?"  Ponder  thereon,  ye  small 
antiquaries,  who  make  barn-door-fowl  flights  of 
learning  in  "Notes  and  Queries!" — ye  Historical 
Societies,  in  one  of  whose  venerable  triremes  I, 
too,  ascend  the  stream  of  time,  while  other 
hands  tug  at  the  oars!  — ye  Amines  of  parasitical 
literature,  who  pick  up  your  grains  of  native- 
grown  food  with  a  bodkin,  having  gorged  upon 
less  honest  fare,  until,  like  the  great  minds 
Goethe  speaks  of,  you  have  "made  a  Golgotha" 
of  your  pages! — ponder  thereon!] 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    Jl 

Before  you  go,  this  morning,  I   want    to 

read  you  a  copy  of  verses.  You  will  understand 
by  the  title  that  they  are  written  in  an  imagi- 
nary character.  I  don't  doubt  they  will  fit  some 
family-man  well  enough.  I  send  it  forth  as  "Oak 
Hall"  projects  a  coat, on  a  priori  grounds  of  con- 
viction that  it  will  suit  somebody.  There  is  no 
loftier  illustration  of  faith  than  this.  It  believes 
that  a  soul  has  been  clad  in  flesh;  that  tender 
parents  have  fed  and  nurtured  it;  that  its  mys- 
terious compages  or  frame-work  has  survived  its 
myriad  exposures  and  reached  the'stature  of  ma- 
turity; that  the  Man,  now  self-determining,  has 
given  in  his  adhesion  to  the  traditions' and  habits 
of  the  race  in  favor  of  artificial  clothing;  that  he 
will,  having  all  the  world  to  choose  from,  select 
the  very  locality  where  this  audacious  generali- 
zation has  been  acted  upon.  It  builds  a  garment 
cut  to  the  pattern  of  an  Idea,  and  trusts -that 
Nature  will  model  a  material  shape  to  fit  it. 
There  is  a  prophecy  in  every  seam,  and  its 
pockets  are  full  of  inspiration. — Now  hear  the 
verses. 

THE  OLD  MAN  DREAMS. 
O  for  one  hour  of  youthful  joy! 

Give  back  ray  twentieth  spring! 
I'd  rather  laugh  a  bright-haired  boy 

Than  reign  a  gray-beard  king! 
Off  with  the  wrinkled  spoils  of  age! 

Away  with  learning's  crown! 
Tear  out  life's  wisdom-written    page, 

And  dash  its  trophies  down! 

One  moment  let  my  life-blood  stream 

From  boyhood's  fount  of  flame! 
Give  me  one  giddy,  reeling  dream 

Of  life  all  love  and  fame! 


72     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

— My  listening  angel  heard  the  prayer 

And  calmly  smiling,  said. 
'  'If  I  but  touch  thy  silvered  hair 

Thy  hasty  wish  hath  sped. 

"But  is  there  nothing  in  thy  track 

To  bid  thee  fondly  stay, 
While  the  swift  seasons  hurry  back 

To  find  the  wished-for  day?" 

— Ah,  truest  soul  of  womankind! 

Without  thee,  what  were  life? 
One  bliss  I  cannot  leave  behind: 

I'll  take — my — precious — wife! 

— The  angel  took  a  sapphire  pen 

And  wrote  in  rainbow  dew, 
"The  man  would  be  a  boy  again, 

And  be  a  husband  too!" 

— "And  is  there  nothing  yet  unsaid 

Before  the  change  appears? 
Remember,  all  their  gifts  have  fled 

With  those  dissolving  years!" 

Why,  yes;  for  memory  would  recall 

My  fond  paternal  joys; 
I  could  not  bear  to  leave  them  all: 

I'll  take — my — girl — and — boys! 

The  smiling  angel  dropped  his  pen, — 

"Why,  this  will  never  do; 
The  man  would  be  a  boy  again, 

And  be  a  father  too!" 

And  so  I  laughed,— my  laughter  woke 
The  household  with  its  noise, — 

And  wrote  my  dream,  when  morning  broke, 
To  please  the  gray-haired  boys. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     73 

IV. 

[I  am  so  well  pleased  with  my  boarding-house 
that  I  intend  to  remain  there,  perhaps  for  years. 
Of  course  I  shall  have  a  great  many  conversa- 
tions to  report,  and  they  will  necessarily  be  of 
different  tone  and  on  different  subjects.  The 
talks  are  like  the  breakfasts, — sometimes  dipped 
toasts,  and  sometimes  dry.  You  must  take  them 
as  they  come.  How  can  I  do  what  all  these 
letters  ask  me  to?  No.  i.  wants  serious  and 
earnest  thought.  No.  2.  (letter  smells  of  bad 
cigars)  must  have  more  jokes;  wants  me  to  tell 
a  "good  storey"  that  he  has  copied  out  for  me. 
(I  suppose  two  letters  before  the  word  "good" 
refer  to  some  Doctor  of  Divinity  who  told  the 
story.)  No.  3.  (in  female  hand) — more  poetry. 
No.  4.  wants  something  that  would  be  of  use  to 
a  practical  man.  (Prahctical  mahn  he  probably 
pronounces  it.)  No.  5.  (gilt-edged, sweet-scented) 
— "more  sentiment," — "heart's  outpourings." — 

My  dear  friends, one  and  all,  lean  do  nothing 
but  report  such  remarks  as  I  happen  to  have 
made  at  our  breakfast-table.  Their  character 
will  depend  on  many  accidents, — a  good  deal  on 
the  particular  persons  in  the  company  to  whom 
they  were  addressed.  It  so  happens  that  those 
which  follow  were  mainly  intended  for  the  di- 
vinity-student and  the  schoolmistress;  though 
others,  whom  I  need  not  mention,  saw  fit  to  in- 
terfere, with  more  or  less  propriety,  in  the 
conversation.  This  is  one  of  my  privileges  as 
a  talker;  and  of  course,  if  I  was  not  talking  for 
our  whole  company,!  don't  expect  all  the  read- 


74     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

ers  of  this  periodical  to  be  interested  in  my  notes 
of  what  was  said.  Still,  I  think  there  may  be 
a  few  that  will  rather  like  this  vein, — possibly 
prefer  it  to  a  livelier  one, — serious  young  men, 
and  young  women  generally,  in  life's  roseate 
parenthesis,  from years  of  age  to in- 
clusive. 

Another  privilege  of  talking  is  to  misquote. — 
Of  course  it  wasn't  Proserpina  that  actually  cut 
the  yellow  hair, — but  Iris.  It  was  the  former 
lady's  regular  business,  but  Dido  had  used  her- 
self ungenteelly,  and  Madame  d'Enfer  stood  firm 
on  the  point  of  etiquette.  So  the  bathycolpian 
Here — Juno,  in  Latin — sent  down  Iris  instead. 
But  I  was  mightily  pleased  to  see  that  one  of 
the  gentlemen  that  do  the  heavy  articles  for 
this  magazine  misquoted  Campbell's  lines  with- 
out any  excuse.  "Waft  us  home  rhe  message"  of 
course  it  ought  to  be.  Will  he  be  duly  grateful 
for  the  correction  ?] 

The  more  we  study  the  body  and  the 

mind,  the  more  we  find  both  to  be  governed, 
not  by,  but  according  to  laws,  such  as  we  observe 
in  the  larger  universe. — You  think  you  know  all 
about  walking, — don't  you,  now?  Well,  how 
do  you  suppose  your  lower  limbs  are  held  to  your 
body?  They  are  sucked  up  by  two  cupping 
vessels  ("cotyloid" — cup-like—cavities),  and 
held  there  as  long  as  you  live,  and  longer.  At 
any  rate,  you  think  you  move  them  backward 
and  forward  at  such  a  rate  as  your  will  deter- 
mines, don't  you?  On  the  contrary,  they  swing 
just  as  any  other  pendulums  swing,  at  a  fixed 
rate,  determined  by  their  length.  You  can  alter 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    75 

this  by  muscular  power, as  you  can  take  hold  of 
the  pendulum  of  a  clock  and  make  it  move  fas- 
ter or  slower;  but  your  ordinary  gait  is  timed  by 
the  same  mechanism  as  the  movements  of  the 
solar  system. 

[My  friend,  the  Professor,  told  me  all  this, 
referring  me  to  certain  German  physiologists  by 
the  name  of  Weber  for  proof  of  the  facts,  which, 
however,  he  said  he  had  often  verified.  I  ap- 
propriated it  to  my  own  use;  what  can  one  do 
better  than  this,  when  one  has  a  friend  that  tells 
him  anything  worth  remembering? 

The  Professor  seems  to  think  that  man  and 
the  general  powers  of  the  universe  are  in  part- 
nership. Some  one  was  saying  that  it  had  cost 
nearly  half  a  million  to  move  the  Leviathan  only 
so  far  as  they  had  got  it  already.  —  Why, — said 
the  Professor, — they  might  have  hired  an 
EARTHQUAKE  for  less  money!] 

Just  as  we  find  a  mathematical  rule  at  the 
bottom  of  many  of  the  bodily  movements,  just 
so  thought  may  be  supposed  to  have  its  regular 
cycles.  Such  or  such  a  thought  comes  round 
periodically.in  its  turn.  Accidental  suggestions, 
however,  so  far  interfere  with  the  regular  cycles, 
that  we  my  find  them  practically  beyond  our 
power  of  recognition.  Take  all  this  for  what 
it  is  worth,  but  at  any  rate  you  will  agree  that 
there  are  certain  particular  thoughts  that  do  not 
come  up  once  a  day,  nor  once  a  week,  but  that 
a  year  would  hardly  go  round  without  your  hav- 
ing them  pass  through  your  mind.  Here  is  one 
that  comes  up  at  intervals  in  this  way.  Some 
one  speaks  of  it,  and  there  is  an  instant  and 


76    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

eager  smile  of  assent  in  the  listener  or  listeners. 
Yes,  indeed;  they  have  often  been  struck  by  it. 

All  at  once  a  conviction  flashes  through  us 
that  we  have  been  in  the  same  precise  circum- 
stances as  at  the  present  instant,  once  or  many 
times  before. 

O,  dear,  yes! — said  one  of  the  company, — 
everybody  has  had  that  feeling. 

The  landlady  didn'  t  K  ow  anything  about  such 
notions;  it  was  an  idee  ii_.  Tolks'  heads,  she  ex- 
pected. 

The  schoolmistress  said  in  a  hesitating  sort  of 
way,  that  she  knew  the  feeling  well,  and  didn't 
like  to  experience  it;  it  made  her  think  she  was 
a  ghost,  sometimes. 

The  young  fellow  whom  they  call  John  said 
he  knew  all  about  it;  he  had  just  lighted  a 
cheroot  the  other  day,  when  a  tremendous  con- 
viction all  at  once  came  over  him  that  he  had 
done  just  that  same  thing  ever  so  many  times 
before.  I  looked  severely  at  him,  and  his  counte- 
nance immediately  fell—  on  the  side  toward  me  \ 
I  cannot  answer  for  the  other,  for  he  can  wink 
and  laugh  with  either  half  of  his  face  without 
the  other  half's  knowing  it. 

— I  have  noticed — I  went  on  to  say — the 
following  circumstances  connected  with  these 
sudden  impressions.  First,  that  the  condition, 
which  seems  to  be  the  duplicate  ot  a  tormer  one 
is  often  very  trivial,  —  one  that  might  have  pre- 
sented itself  a  hundred  times.  Secondly,  that 
the  impression  is  very  evanescent^ and  that  it  is 
Irj^eljCiLfiver^ recalled  by  any  Voluntary  ellort," 
at  least  after  anytime 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    77 

there  is  a  disinclination  to  record  the  circum- 
stances, and  a  sense  of  incapacity  to  reproduce 
the  state  of  mind  in  words.  Fourthly,  I  have 
often  felt  that  the  duplicate  condition  had  not 
only  occurred  once  before,  but  that  it  was 
familiar,  and  as  it  seemed,  habitual.  Lastly,  I 
have  had  the  same  convictions  in  my  dreams. 

How  do  I  account  for  it? — Why,  there  are 
several  ways  that  I  can  mention,  and  you  may 
take  your  choice.  Tb  'j&st  is  that  which  the 
young  lady  hinted  at;^-that  these  flashes  are 
sudden  recollections  of  a  previous  existence.  I 
don't  believe  that;  for  I  remember  a  poor  student 
I  used  to  know  told  me  he  had  such  a  conviction 
one  day  when  he  was  blacking  his  boots,  and  I 
can't  think  he  had  ever  lived  in  another  world 
where  they  use  Day  and  Martin. 

Some  think  that  Dr.  Wigans'  doctrine  of  the  \ 
brains  being  a  double  organ,  its  hemispheres  / 
working  together  like  the  two  eyes,  accounts  for 
it.  One  of  the  hemispheres  hangs  fire,  they 
suppose,  and  the  small  interval  between  the 
perceptions  of  the  nimble  and  the  sluggish  half  \ 
seems  an  indefinitely  long  period,  and  there- 
fore the  second  perception  appears  to  be  the 
copy  of  another,  ever  so  old.  But  even  allow- 
ing the  center  of  perception  to  be  double,  lean 
see  no  good  reason  for  supposing  this  indefinite 
lengthening  of  the  time,  nor  any  analogy  that 
bears  it  out.  It  seems  to  me  most  likely  that 
the  coincidence  of  circumstances  is  very  partial, 
but  that  we  take  this  partial  resemblance  for 
identity  as  we  occasionally  do  resemblances  of 
persons.  A  momentary  posture  of  circum- 


78    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST  -TABLE 

stances  is  so  far  like  some  preceding  on  e  that 
we  accept  it  as  exactly  the  same,  just  as  we  ac- 
cost a  stranger  occasionally,  mistaking  him  for 
a  friend.  The  apparent  similarity  may  be  ow- 
ing, perhaps,  quite  as  much  to  the  mental  state 
at  the  time  as  to  the  outward  circumstances. 

— Here  is  another  of  these  curiously  recur- 
ring remarks.  I  have  said  it  and  heard  it  many 
times,  and  occasionally  met  with  something  like 
it  in  books, — somewhere  in  Bulwer's  novels,  I 
think,  and  in  one  of  the  works  of  Mr.  Olmsted, 
I  know. 

Memory,  imagination,  old  sentiments  and 
associations,  are  more  readily  reached  tJirougli 
the  sense  of  SMELL  than  by  almost  any  other 
channel. 

Of  course  the  particular  odors  which  act  upon 
each  person's  susceptibilities  differ. — O,  yes!  I 
will  tell  you  some  of  mine  The  smell  of  phos- 
phorus is  one  of  them.  During  a  year  or  two 
of  adolescence  I  used  to  be  dabbling  in  chem- 
istry a  good  deal,  and  as  about  that  time  I  had 
my  little  aspirations  and  passions  like  another, 
some  of  these  things  got  mixed  up  with  each 
other:  orange-colored  fumes  of  nitrous  acid, and 
visions  as  bright  and  transient;  reddening  lit- 
mus-paper, and  blushing  cheeks; — eheu\ 

"Soles  occidere  et  redire  possunt," 

but  there  is  no  reagent  that  will  redden  the  faded 

roses  of  eighteen  hundred  and spare  them! 

But,  as  I  was  saying,  phosphorus  fires  this  train 
of  associations  in  an  instant;  its  luminous  vapors 
with  their  penetrating  odor  throw  me  into  a 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     79 

trance;  it  comes  to  me  in  a  doublle  sense"trailing 
clouds  of  glory."  Only  the  confounded  Vienna 
matches  ohne  pkosphor-geruch,  have  worn  my 
sensibilities  a  little. 

Then  there  is  the  •\n^rig^ld.  When  I  was  of 
smallest  dimensions,  and  wont  to  ride  im- 
pacted between  the  knees  of  fond  parental  pair, 
we  would  sometimes  cross  the  bridge  to  the  next 
village  town  and  stop  opposite  a  low,  brown, 
"gambrel-roofed"  cottage.  Out  of  it  would 
come  one  Sally,  sister  of  its  swarthy  tenant, 
swarthy  herself,  shady-lipped,  sad-voiced,  and, 
bending  over  her  flower-bed,  would  gather  a 
"posy,"  as  she  called  it,  for  the  little  boy. 
Sally  lies  in  the  churchyard  with  a  slab  of  blue 
slate  at  her  head,  lichen-crusted,  and  leaning  a 
little  within  the  last  few  years.  Cottage,  gar- 
den-beds, posies,  grenadier-like  rows  of  seedling 
onions — stateliest  of  vegetables, —  all  are  gone, 
but  the  breath  of  a  marigold  brings  them  all 
back  to  me. 

Perhaps  the  herb  everlasting,\.\\Q  fragrant  im- 
mortelle of  our  autumn  fields,  has  the  most 
suggestive  odor  to  me  of  all  those  that  set  me 
dreaming.  I  can  hardly  describe  the  strange 
thoughts  and  emotions  that  come  to  me  as  I  in- 
hale the  aroma  of  its  pale,  dry,  rustling  flowers. 
A  something  it  has  of  sepulchral  spicery,  as  if 
it  had  been  brought  from  the  core  of  some  great 
pyramid,  where  it  ha'i  lain  on  the  breast  of  a 
mu.nmied  Pharaoh.  Something,  too,  of  immor- 
tality in  the  sad,  faint  sweetness  lingering  so 
long  in  its  lifeless  petals.  Yet  this  does  not  tell 
why  it  fills  my  eyes  with  tears  and  carries  me  in 


80    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

blissful  thought  to  the  banks  of  asphodel  that 
border  the  River  of  Life. 

1  should  not  have  talked  so  much  about 

these  personal  susceptibilities,  if  I  had  not  a 
remark  to  make  about  them  that  I  believe  is  a 
new  one.  It  is  this.  There  may  be  a  physical 
reason  for  the  strange  connection  between  the 
sense  of  smell  and  the  mind.  The  olfactory 
nerve — so  my  friend,  the  Professor,  tells  me — is 
the  only  one  directly  connected  with  the  hemi- 
spheres of  the  brain,  the  parts  in  which,  as  we 
have  every  reason  to  believe,  the  intellectual 
processes  are  performed.  To  speak  more  truly, 
the  olfactory  "nerve"  is  not  a  nerve  at  all,  he 
says,  but  a  part  of  the  brain,  in  intimate  con- 
nection with  its  anterior  lobes.  Whether  this 
anatomical  arrangement  is  at  the  bottom  of  the 
facts  I  have  mentioned,  I  will  not  decide,  but 
it  is  curious  enough  to  be  worth  remembering. 
Contrast  the  sense  of  taste,  as  a  source  of  sug- 
gestive impressions,  with  that  of  smell.  Now 
the  Professor  assures  me  that  you  will  find  the 
nerve  of  taste  has  no  immediate  connection  with 
the  brain  proper,  but  only  with  the  prolongation 
of  the  spinal  cord. 

[The  old  gentleman  opposite  did  not  pay  much 
attention,  I  think,  to  this  hypothesis  of  mine. 
But  while  I  was  speaking  about  the  sense  of 
smell  he  nestled  about  in  his  seat,  and  presently 
succeeded  in  getting  out  a  large  red  bandanna 
handkerchief.  Then  he  lurched  a  little  to  the 
other  side,  and  after  much  tribulation  at  last 
extricated  an  ample  round  snuff-box.  I  looked 
as  he  opened  it  and  felt  for  the  wonted  pugil. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    8 1 

Moist  rappee,  and  a  Tonka-bean  lying  therein. 
I  made  the  manual  sign  understood  of  all  man- 
kind that  use  the  precious  dust,  and  presently 
my  brain,  too,  responded  to  the  long  unused 

stimulus. O  boys, — that  were, —  actual  papas 

and  possible  grandpapas, — some  of  you  with 
crowns  like  billiard-balls, — some  in  locks  of 
sable  silvered,  and  some  of  silver  sabled, — do 
you  rjemember,  as  you  doze  over  this,  those 
after-dinners  at  the  Trois  Freres,  when  the 
Scotch-plaided  snuff-box  went  round,  and  the 
dry  Lundy-Foot  tickled  its  way  along  into  our 
happy  sensoria?  Then  it  was  that  the  Cham- 
bertin  or  the  Clot  Vougeot  came  in,  slumbering 
in  its  straw  cradle.  And  one  among  you, — do 
you  remember  how  he  would  have  a  bit  of  ice 
always  in  his  Burgundy,  and  sit  tinkling  it  against 
the  sides  of  the  bubble-like  glass,  saying  that 
he  was  hearing  the  cow-bells  as  he  used  to  hear 
them,  when  the  deep-breathing  kine  came  home 
at  twilight  from  the  huckleberry  pasture,  in  the 
old  home  a  thousand  leagues  toward  the  sunset  ?] 
Ah,  me!  what  strains  and  strophes  of  un- 
written verse  pulsate  through  my  soul  when  I 
open  a  certain  closet  in  the  ancient  house  where 
I  was  born !  On  its  shelves  used  to  lie  bundles 
of  sweet-marjoram  and  pennyroyal  and  laven- 
der and  mint  and  catnip;  there  apples  were 
stored  until  their  seeds  should  grow  black,  which 
happy  period  there  were  sharp  little  milk-teeth 
always  ready  to  anticipate;  there  peaches  lay  in 
the  dark,  thinking  of  the  sunshine  they  had  lost, 
until,  like  the  hearts  of  saints  that  dream  of 
heaven  in  their  sorrow,  they  grew  fragrant  as 


82     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

the  breath  of  angels.  The  odorous  echo  of  a 
score  of  dead  summers  lingers  yet  in  those  dim 
recesses. 

Do    I    remember     Byron's    line,    about 

"striking  the  electric  chain"? — To  be  sure  I  do. 
I  sometimes  think  the  less  the  hint  that  stirs 
the  automatic  machinery  of  association,  the 
more  easily  this  moves  us.  What  can  be  more 
trivial  than  that  old  story  of  opening  the  folio 
Shakespeare  that  used  to  lie  in  some  ancient  En- 
glish hall  and  finding  the  flakes  of  Christmas 
pastry  between  its  leaves,  shut  up  in  them  per- 
haps a  hundred  years  ago?  And,  lo!  as  one 
looks  on  these  poor  relics  of  a  bygone  genera- 
tion, the  universe  changes  in  the  twinkling  of 
an  eye;  old  George  the  Second  is  back  again, 
and  the  elder  Pitt  is  coming  into  power,  and 
General  Wolfe  is  a  fine,  promising  young  man, 
and  over  the  Channel  they  are  pulling  the  Sieur 
Damiens  to  pieces  with  wild  horses, and  across 
the  Atlantic  the  Indians  are  tomahawking 
Hiramsand  Jonathans  and  Jonases  at  Fort  Wil- 
liam Henry;  all  the  dead  people  that  have  been 
in  the  dust  so  long — even  to  the  stout-armed 
cook  that  made  the  pastry — are  alive  again;  the 
planet  unwinds  a  hundred  of  its  luminous  coils, 
and  the  procession  of  the  equinoxes  is  retraced 
on  the  dial  of  heaven!  And  all  this  for  a  bit  of 
pie-crust! 

1  will  thank  you  for  that   pie, — said   the 

provoking  young  fellow  whom  I  have  named  re- 
peatedly. He  looked  at  it  for  a  moment,  and 
put  his  hands  to  his  eyes  as  if  moved. — I  was 
thinking, — he  said,  indistinctly 

How?     What  is't? — said  our  landlady. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     83 

— I  was  thinking — said  he — who  was  king  of 
England  when  this  old  pie  was  baked, — and  it 
made  me  feel  bad  to  think  how  long  he  must 
have  been  dead. 

Our  landlady  is  a  decent  body,  poor  and  a 
widow,  of  course;  cele  va  sans  dire.  She  told 
me  her  story  once;  it  was  as  if  a  grain  of  corn 
that  had  been  ground  and  bolted  had  tried  to 
individualize  itself  by  a  special  narrative.  There 
was  the  wooing  and  the  wedding, — the  start  in 
life, — the  disappointment, — the  children  she  had 
buried, — the  struggle  against  fate, — the  dis- 
mantling of  life,  first  of  its  small  luxuries,  and 
then  of  its  comforts,  —the  broken  spirits,  — the 
altered  character  of  the  one  on  whom  she  leaned, 
— and  at  last  the  death  that  came  and  drew  the 
black  curtain  between  her  and  all  her  earthly 
hopes. 

I  never  laughed  at  my  landlady  after  she  had 
told  me  her  story,  but  I  often  cried, — not  those 
pattering  tears  that  run  off  the  eaves  upon  our 
neighbors' grounds,  the  stillicidium  of  self-consci- 
tous  sentiment,  but  those  which  steal  noiselessly 
through  their  conduits  until  they  reach  the  cis- 
terns lying  round  about  the  heart;  those  tears 
}hat  we  weep  inwardly  with  unchanging  features; 
such  I  did  shed  for  her  often  when  the  imps  of 
the  boarding-house  Inferno  tugged  at  her  soul 
with  their  red-hot  pincers. 

Young  man, — I  said, — the  pastry  you  speak 
lightly  of  is  not  old,  but  courtesy  to  those  who 
labor  to  serve  us,  especially  if  they  are  of  the 
weaker  sex,  is  very  old,  and  yet  well  worth  re- 
taining. The  pastry  looks  to  me  as  if  it  were 


84     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

tender,  but  I  know  that  the  hearts  of  women 
are  so.  May  I  recommend  to  you  the  following 
caution,  as  a  guide,  whenever  you  are  dealing 
with  a  woman,  or  an  artist,  or  a  poet; — if  you 
are  handling  an  editor  or  politician,  it  is  super- 
fluous advice.  I  take  it  from  the  back  of  one 
of  those  little  French  toys  which  contain  paste- 
board figures  moved  by  a  small  running  stream 
of  fine  sand;  Benjamin  Franklin  will  translate 
it  for  you:  "Quoiqu'elle  soit  tres  solidement 
montee,il  fant  ne pas  BRUTALISER  la  machine." — I 
will  thank  you  for  the  pie,  if  you  please. 

[I  took  more  of  it  than  was  good  for  me, — as 
much  as  85°,  I  should  think, — and  had  an  indi- 
gestion in  consequence.  While  I  was  suffering 
from  it,  I  wrote  some  sadly  desponding  poems, 
and  a  theological  essay  which  took  a  very  mel- 
ancholy view  of  creation.  When  I  got  better 
I  labeled  them  all  "Pie-crust,"  and  laid  them 
by  as  scarecrows  and  solemn  warnings.  I  have 
a  number  of  books  on  my  shelves  that  I  should 
like  to  label  with  some  such  title;  but,  as  they 
have  great  names  on  their  title-pages, — Doctors 
of  Divinity,  some  of  them, — it  wouldn't  do.] 

My  friend,  the  Professor,  whom    I    have 

mentioned  to  you  once  or  twice,  told  me  yester- 
day that  somebody  had  been  abusing  him  in  some 
of  the  journals  of  his  calling.  I  told  him  that  I 
didn't  doubt  he  deserved  it;  that  I  hoped  he  did 
deserve  a  little  abuse  occasionally,  and  woul< 
for  a  number  of  years  to  come;  that  nobody' 
could  do  anything  to  make  his  neighbors  wiser 
or  better  without  being  liable  to  abuse  for 
especially  that  people  hated  to  have  their  little' 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    85 

mistakes  made  fun  of,  and  perhaps  he  had  been 
doing  something  of  the  kind. — The  Professor 
smiled. — Now,  said  I,  hear  what  I  am  going  to 
say.  It  will  not  take  many  years  to  bring  you 
to  the  period  of  life  when  men,  at  least  the 
majority  of  writing  and  talking  men,  do  nothing 
but  praise.  Men,  like  peaches  and  pears,  grow 
sweet  a  little  while  before  they  begin  to  decay. 
I  don't  know  what  it  is, — whether  a  spontaneous 
change,  mental  or  bodily,  or  whether  it  is  thor- 
ough experience  of  the  thanklessness  of  critical 
honesty, — but  it  is  a  fact,  that  most  writers, 
except  sour  and  unsuccessful  ones,  get  tired  of 
finding  fault  at  about  the  time  when  they  are 
beginning  to  grow  old.  As  a  general  thing,  I 
would  not  give  a  great  deal  for  the  fair  words  of 
a  critic,  if  he  is  himself  an  author,  over  fifty  years 
of  age.  At  thirty  we  are  all  trying  to  cut  our 
names  in  big  letters  upon  the  walls  of  this  tene- 
ment of  life;  twenty  years  later  we  have  carved 
it,  or  shut  up  our  jackknives.  Then  we  are 
ready  to  help  others,  and  care  less  to  hinder 
any,  because  nobody's  elbows  are  in  our  way. 
So  I  am  glad  you  have  a  little  life  left;  you  will 
be  saccharine  enough  in  a  few  years. 

— Some  of  the  softening  effects  of  advanc- 
ing age  have  struck  me  very  much  in  what  I  have 
heard  or  seen  here  and  elsewhere.  I  just  now 
spoke  of  the  sweetening  process  that  authors 
undergo.  Do  you  know  that  in  the  gradual 
passage  from  maturity  to  helplessness  the  harsh- 
est characters  sometimes  have  a  period  in  which 
they  are  gentle  and  placid  as  young  children?  I 
have  heard  it  said,  but  I  cannot  be  sponsor  for 


86    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

its  truth,  that  the  famous  chieftain,  Lochiel,  was 
rocked  in  a  cradle  like  a  baby,  in  his  old  age. 
An  old  man,  whose  studies  had  been  of  the  se- 
verest scholastic  kind,  used  to  love  to  hear  little 
nursery  stories  read  over  and  over  to  him.  One 
who  saw  the  Duke  of  Wellington  in  his  last  years 
describes  him  as  very  gentle  in  his  aspect  and 
demeanor.  I  remember  a  person  of  singularly 
stern  and  lofty  bearing  who  became  remarkably 
gracious  and  easy  in  all  his  ways  in  the  later 
period  of  his  life. 

And  that  leads  me  to  say  that  men  often  re- 
mind me  of  pears  in  their  way  of  coming  to  ma- 
turity. Some  are  ripe  at  twenty,  like  human 
Jargonelles,  and  must  be  made  the  most  of,  for 
their  day  is  soon  over.  Some  come  into  their 
perfect  condition  late,  like  the  autumn  kinds, 
and  they  last  better  than  the  summer  fruit.  And 
some,  that,  like  the  Winter-Nelis,  have  been 
hard  and  uninviting  until  all  the  rest  have  had 
their  season,  get  their  glow  and  perfume  long 
after  the  frost  and  snow  have  done  their  worst 
with  the  orchards.  Beware  of  rash  criticisms; 
the  rough  and  stringent  fruit  you  condemn  may 
be  an  autumn  or  a  winter  pear,  and  that  which 
you  picked  up  beneath  the  same  bough  in  Au- 
gust may  have  been  only  its  worm-eaten  windfalls. 
Milton  was  a  Saint-Germain  with  a  graft  of  the 
roseate  Early-Catherine.  Rich,  juicy,  lively, 
fragrant,  russet-skinned  old  Chaucer  was  an 
Easter-Beurre;  the  buds  of  a  new  summer  were 
swelling  when  he  ripened. 

— There  is  no  power  I  envy  so  much — said 
the  divinity-student — as.that  of  seeing  analogies 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    87 

and  making  comparisons.  I  don't  understand 
how  it  is  that  some  minds  are  continually  coup- 
ling thoughts  or  objects  that  seem  not  in  the  least 
related  to  each  other,  until  all  at  once  they  are 
put  in  a  certain  light,  and  you  wonder  that  you 
did  not  always  see  that  they  were  as  like  as  a 
pair  of  twins.  It  appears  to  me  a  sort  of  mi- 
raculous gift. 

[He  is  rather  a  nice  young  man,  and  I  think 
has  an  appreciation  of  the  higher  mental  qual- 
ities remarkable  for  one  of  his  years  and  train- 
ing. I  try  his  head  occasionally  as  housewives 
try  eggs,  —  give  it  an  intellectual  shake  and  hold 
it  up  to  the  light,  so  to  speak,  to  see  if  it  has 
life  in  it,  actual  or  potential,  or  only  contains 
lifeless  albumen.] 

You  call  it  miraculous,  —  I  replied, — tossing 
the  expression  with  my  faci'al  eminence,  a  little 
smartly,  I  fear. — Two  men  are  walking  by  the 
polyphlresbcean  ocean,  one  of  them  having  a 
small  tin  cup  with  which  he  can  scoop  up  a  gill 
of  sea-water  when  he  will,  and  the  other  noth- 
ing but  his  hands,  which  will  hardly  hold  water 
at  all, — and  you  call  the  tin  cup  a  miraculous 
possession!  It  is  the  ocean  that  is  the  miracle, 
my  infant  apostle!  Nothing  is  clearer  than  that 
all  things  are  in  all  things,  and  that  just  ac- 
cording to  the  intensity  and  extension  of  our 
mental  being  we  shall  see  the  many  in  the  one 
and  the  one  in  the  many.  Did  Sir  Isaac  think 
what  he  was  saying  when  he  made  his  speech 
about  the  ocean, — the  child  and  the  pebbles, 
you  know?  Did  he  mean  to  speak  slightingly 
of  a  pebble?  Of  a  spherical  solid  which  stood 


88    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

sentinel  over  its  compartment  of  space  before  the 
stone  that  became  the  pyramids  had  grown 
solid,  and  has  watched  it  until  now!  A  body 
which  knows  all  the  currents  of  force  that  traverse 
the  globe;  which  holds  by  invisible  threads  to 
the  ring  of  Saturn  and  the  belt  of  Orion !  A  body 
from  the  contemplation  of  which  an  archangel 
could  infer  the  entire  inorganic  universe  as  the 
simplest  of  corollaries!  A  throne  of  the  all- 
pervading  Deity,  who  has  guided  its  every  atom 
since  the  rosary  of  heaven  was  strung  with 
beaded  stars! 

So, — to  return  to  our  walk  by  the  ocean, — if 
all  that  poetry  has  dreamed,  all  that  insanity 
has  raved,  all  that  maddening  narcotics  have 
driven  through  the  brains  of  men,  or  smothered 
passion  nursed  in  the  fancies  of  women, — if  the 
dreams  of  colleges  and  convents  and  boarding- 
schools,— if  every  human  feeling  that  sighs,  or 
smiles,  or  curses,  or  shrieks,  or  groans,  should 
bring  all  their  innumerable  images,such  as  come 
with  every  hurried  heart-beat, — the  epic  that 
held  them  all,  though  its  letters  filled  the  zodiac, 
would  be  but  a  cupful  from  the  infinite  ocean 
of  similitudes  and  analogies  that  rolls  through 
the  universe. 

[The  divinity-student  honored  himself  by  the 
way  in  which  he  received  this.  He  did  not 
swallow  it  at  once,  neither  did  he  reject  it;  but 
he  took  it  as  a  pickerel  takes  the  bait,  and  car- 
ried it  off  with  him  to  his  hole  (in  the  fourth  story) 
to  deal  with  at  his  leisuie.] 

Here  is  another  remark  made  for  his 

especial  benefit. — There  is  a  natural  tendency 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     89 

in  many  persons  to  run  their  adjectives  together 
in  triads,  as  I  have  heard  them  called, — thus: 
He  was  honorable,  courteous,  and  brave;  she 
was  graceful,  pleasing  and  virtuous.  Dr.  John- 
son is  famous  for  this;  I  think  it  was  Bulwer 
who  said  you  could  separate  a  paper  in  the 
"Rambler"  into  three  distinct  essays.  Many  of 
our  writers  show  the  same  tendency,  —  my  friend, 
the  Professor,  especially.  Some  think  it  is  in 
humble  imitation  of  Johnson, — some  that  it  is 
for  the  sake  of  the  stately  sound  only.  I  don't 
think  they  get  to  the  bottom  of  it.  It  is,  I  sus- 
pect, an  instinctive  and  involuntary  effort  of  the 
mind  to  present  a  thought  or  image  with  the 
three  dimensions  that  belong  to  every  solid, — 
an  unconscious  handling  of  an  idea  as  if  it  had 
length,  breadth,  and  thickness.  It  is  a  great 
deal  easier  to  say  this  than  to  prove  it,  and  a 
great  deal  easier  to  dispute  it  than  to  disprove 
it.  But  mind  this:  the  more  we  observe  and 
study,  the  wider  we  find  the  range  of  the  auto- 
matic and  instinctive  principles  in  body,  mind, 
and  morals,  and  the  narrower  the  limits  of  the 
self-determining  conscious  movement. 

— I  have  often  seen  pianoforte  players  and 
singers  make  such  strange  motions  over  their  in- 
struments or  song-books  that  I  wanted  to  laugh 
at  them.  "Where  did  our  friends  pick  up  all  these 
fine  ecstatic  airs?"  I  would  say  to  myself.  Then 
I  would  remember  My  Lady  in  "Marriage  a  la 
Mode,"  and  amuse  myself  with  thinking  how 
affectation  was  the  same  thing  in  Hogarth's  time 
and  in  our  own.  But  one  day  I  bought  me  a 
Canary-bird  and  hung  him  up  in  a  cage  at  my 


90        THE   AUTOCRAT    OF  THE   BREAKFAST-TABLE 

window.  By-and-by  he  found  himself  at  home, 
and  began  to  pipe  his  little  tunes;  and  there  he 
was,  sure  enough,  swimming  and  waving  about, 
with  all  the  droopings  and  liftings  and  languish- 
ing side-turnings  of  the  head  that  I  had  laughed 
at.  And  now  I  should  like  to  ask,  WHO  taught 
him  all  this? — and  me,  through  him,  that  the 
foolish  head  was  not  the  one  swinging  itself  from 
side  to  side  and  bowing  and  nodding  over  the 
music,  but  that  other  which  was  passing  its  shal- 
low and  self-satisfied  judgment  on  a  creature 
made  of  finer  clay  than  the  frame  which  carried 
that  same  head  upon  its  shoulders? 

— Do  you  want  an  image  of  the  human 
will,  or  the  self-determining  principle,  as  com- 
pared with  its  prearranged  and  impassable  re- 
strictions? A  drop  of  water,  imprisoned  in  a 
crystal;  you  may  see  such  a  one  in  any  mineral- 
ogical  collection.  One  little  fluid  particle  in 
the  crystalline  prism  of  the  solid  universe! 

— Weaken  moral  obligations? — No,  not 
weaken,  but  define  them.  When  I  preach  that 
sermon  L spoke  of  the  other  day,  I  shall  have  to 
lay  down  some  principles  not  fully  recognized  in 
some  of  your  textbooks. 

I  should  have  to  begin  with  one  most  formi- 
dable preliminary.  You  saw  an  article  the  other 
day  in  one  of  the  journals,  perhaps,  in  which 
some  old  Doctor  or  other  said  quietly  that  pa- 
tients were  very  apt  to  be  fools  and  cowards. 
But  a  great  many  of  the  clergyman's  patients 
are  not  only  fools  and  cowards,  but  also  liars. 

[Immense  sensation  at  the  table. — Sudden  re- 
tirement of  the  angular  female  in  oxydated 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    9 1 

bombazine.  Movement  of  adhesion — as  they 
say  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies — on  the  part  of 
the  young  fellow  they  call  John.  Falling  of  the 
old-gentleman-opposite's  lower  jaw — (gravita- 
tion is  beginning  to  get  the  better  of  him).  Our 
landlady  to  Benjamin  Franklin,  briskly,  Go  to 
school  right  off,  there's  a  good  boy!  Schoolmis- 
tress curious,  —  takes  a  quick  glance  at  divinity- 
student.  Divinity  student  slightly  flushed;  draws 
his  shoulders  back  a  little,  as  if  a  big  falsehood 
—  or  truth — had  hit  him  in  the  forehead.  Myself 
calm.] 

—I  should  not  make  such  a  speech  as  that, 
you  know,  without  having  pretty  substantial  in- 
dorsers  to  fall  kack  upon,  in  case  my  credit  should 
be  disputed.  Will  you  run  up-stairs,  Benjamin 
Franklin  (for  B.  F.  had  not  gone  right  off,  of 
course),  and  bring  down  a  small  volume  from 
the  left  upper  corner  of  the  right-hand  shelves? 
[Look  at  the  precious  little  black,  ribbed- 
backed,  clean-typed,  vellum-papered,  32mo. 
"DESIDERII  ERASMI  COLLOQUIA."  Amstelodami. 
Typis  Ludovici  Elzevirii.  1650."  Various 
names  written  on  title  page.  Most  conspicuous 
this:  Gul.  Cookeson:  E.  Coll.  Omn.  Anim. 
1725.  Oxon. 

— O  William  Cookeson,  of  All-Souls  Col- 
lege,Oxford, — then  writing  as  I  now  write — now 
in  the  dust,  where  I  shall  lie, — is  this  line  all  that 
remains  to  thee  of  earthly  remembrance?  Thy 
name  is  at  least  once  more  spoken  by  living  men; 
— is  it  a  pleasure  to  thee?  Thou  shalt  share 
with  me  my  little  draught  of  immortality, — its 
week,  its  month,  its  year,  whatever  it  may  be, 


Q2    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

— and  then  we  will  go  together  into  the  solemn 
archives  of  Oblivion's  Uncatalogued  Library.] 

If  you  think  I  have  used  rather  strong  lan- 
guage, I  shall  have  to  read  something  to  you 
out  of  the  book  of  this  keen  and  witty  scholar, 
— the  great  Erasmus, — who  "laid  the  egg  of  the 
Reformation  which  Luther  hatched."  Oh,  you 
never  read  his  Naufragiiim,  or  "Shipwreck,"  did 
you?  Of  course  not;  for,  if  you  had,  I  don't 
think  you  would  have  given  me  credit — or  dis- 
credit— for  entire  originality  in  that  speech  of 
mine.  That  men  are  cov\ards  in  the  contem- 
plation of  futurity  he  illustrates  by  the  extraor- 
dinary antics  of  many  on  board  the  sinking  ves- 
sel; that  they  are  fools,  by  their  praying  to  the 
sea,  and  making  promises  to  bits  cf  wood  from 
the  true  cross,  and  all  manner  of  similar  non- 
sense; that  they  are  fools,  cowards,  and  liars 
all  at  once,  by  this  story:  I  will  put  it  into 
rough  English  for  you.— "I  couldn't  help  laugh- 
ing to  hear  one  fellow  bawling  out,  so  that  he 
might  be  sure  to  be  heard,  a  promise  to  Saint 
Christopher  of  Paris — the  monstrous  statue  in 
the  great  church  there — that  he  would  give  him 
a  wax  taper  as  big  as  himself.  'Mi  nd  what 
you  promise!'  said  an  acquaintance  that  stood 
near  him,  poking  him  with  his  elbow;  'you 
couldn't  pay  for  it,  if  you  sold  all  your  things 
at  auction.'  'Hold  your  tongue,  you  donkey,' 
said  the  fellow, — but  softly, so  that  Saint  Chris- 
topher should  not  hear  him,  —  'do  you  think  I'm 
in  earnest?  If  I  once  get  my  foot  on  dry  ground, 
catch  me  giving  him  so  much  as  a  tallow  can- 
dle!'" 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     93 

Now,  therefore,  remembering  that  those  who 
have  been  loudest  in  their  talk  about  the  great 
subject  of  which  we  were  speaking  have  not 
necessarily  been  wise,  brave,  and  true  men, but, 
on  the  contrary,  have  very  often  been  wanting 
in  one  or  two  or  all  the  qualities  these  words 
imply,  I  should  expect  to  find  a  good  many  doc- 
trines current  in  the  schools  which  I  should  be 
obliged  to  call  foolish,  cowardly,  and  false. 

—So  you  would  abuse  other  people's  beliefs, 
Sir,  and  yet  not  tell  us  your  own  creed! — said 
the  divinity-student, coloring  up  with  a  spirit  for 
which  I  liked  him  all  the  better. 

— I  have  a  creed,  —I  replied; — none  better 
and  none  shorter.  It  is  told  in  two  words, — 
the  two  first  of  the  Paternoster.  And  when  I 
say  these  words  I  mean  them.  And  when  I 
compared  the  human  will  to  a  drop  in  a  crystal, 


and  said  I  meant  to  define  moral  obligations^ 
ancfnot  weaken  them,  ***'",  "^c  *rHtT  inttnTlH — 
to  e x pre as :  t  h  a  t  the  fluent,  self-determining 
power  of  human  beings  is  a  very  strictly  limited 
agency  in  the  universe.  Th_e_chief  planes  of  its 
enclosing  solid  are,  of  course,  organization,  edu- 
cation, condition.  Organization  may  reduce 
the  power  of  the  will  to  nothing,  as  in  some 
idiots;  and  from  this  zero  the  scale  mounts  up- 
wards by  slight  gradations.  Education  is  only 
second  to  nature.  Imagine  all  the  infants  born 
this  year  in  Boston  and  Timbuctoo  to  change 
places!  Condition  does  less,  but  "Give  me 
neither  poverty  nor  riches"  was  the  prayer  of 
Agur,  and  with  good  reason.  If  there  is  any 
improvement  in  modern  theology  it  is  in  getting 


94    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

out  of  the  region  of  pure  abstractions  and  tak- 
ing these  every-day  working  forces  in  to  account. 
The  great  theological  question  now  heaving  and 
throbbing  in  the  minds  of  Christian  men  is 
this:— 

No,  I  won't  talk  about  these  things  now.  My 
remarks  might  be  repeated,  and  it  would  give 
my  friends  pain  to  see  with  what  personal  in- 
civilities I  should  be  visited.  Besides,  what 
business  has  a  mere  boarder  to  be  talking  about 
such  things  at  a  breakfast-table?  Let  him  make 
puns.  To  be  sure, he  was  brought  up  among  the 
Christian  fathers,  and  learned  his  alphabet  out 
of  a  quarto  "Concilium  Tridentinum."  He  has 
also  heard  many  thousand  theological  lectures 
by  men  of  various  denominations;  and  it  is  not 
at  all  to  the  credit  of  these  teachers,  if  he  is  not 
fit  by  this  time  to  express  an  opinion  on  theo- 
logical matters. 

I  know  well  enough  that  there  are  some  .of 
you  who  had  a  great  deal  rather  see  me  stand 
on  my  head  than  use  it  for  any  purpose  of 
thought.  Does  not  my  friend,  the  Professor, 
receive  at  least  two  letters  a  week,  requesting 

him  to , — on  the  strength  of 

some  youthful  antic  of  his,  which,  no  doubt, 
authorizes  the  intelligent  constituency  of  auto- 
graph hunters  to  address  him  as  a  harlequin  ? 

— Well,  I  can't  be  savage  with  you  for 
wanting  to  laugh, and  I  like  to  make  you  laugh, 
well  enough,  when  I  can.  But  then  observe 
this:  if  the  sense  of  the  ridiculous  is  one  side  of 
an  impressible  nature,  it  is  very  well;  but  if 
that  is  all  there  is  in  a  man,  he  had  better  have 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    95 

been  an  ape  at  once,  and  so  have  stood  at  the 
head  of  his  profession.  Laughter  and  tears  are 
meant  to  turn  the  wheel? of  the  same  machinery 
of  sensibility;  one  in  wind-power,  and  the  other 
water-power;  that  is  all.  I  have  often  heard  the 
Professor  talk  about  hysterics  as  being  Nature's 
cleverest  illustration  of  the  reciprocal  con- 
vertibility of  the  two  states  of  which  these  acts 
are  the  manifestations;  but  you  may  see  it  every 
day  in  children;  and  if  you  want  to  choke  with 
stifled  tears  at  sight  of  the  transition, as  it  shows 
itself  in  older  years,  go  and  see  Mr.  Blake  play 
Jesse  Rural. 

It  is  a  very  dangerous  thing  for  a  literary  man  to 
indulge  his  love  for  the  ridiculous.  People  laugh 
with  him  just  so  long  as  he  amuses  them;  but 
if  he  attempts  to  be  serious,  they  must  still  have 
their  laugh,  and  so  they  laugh  at  him.  There  is 
in  addition,  however,  a  deeper  reason  for  this 
than  would  at  first  appear.  Do  you  know  that 
you  feel  a  little  superior  to  every  man  who  makes 
you  laugh,  whether  by  making  faces  or  verses? 
Are  you  aware  that  you  have  a  pleasant  sense 
of  patronizing  him  when  you  condescend  so  far 
as  to  let  him  turn  somersets,  literal  or  literary, 
for  your  royal  delight?  Now  if  a  man  can  only 
be  allowed  to  stand  on  a  dais,  or  raised  plat- 
form, and  look  down  on  his  neighbor  who  is 
exerting  his  talent  for  him,  oh,  it  is  all  right  — 
first-rate  performance — and  all  the  rest  of  the 
fine  phrases.  But  if  all  at  once  the  performer 
asks  the  gentleman  to  come  upon  the  floor,  and, 
stepping  upon  the  platform,  begins  to  talk  down 
at  him, — ah,  that  wasn't  in  the  programme. 


96    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

I  have  never  forgotten  what  happened  when 
Sydney  Smith — who,  as  everybody  knows,  was 
an  exceedingly  sensible  man,  and  a  gentleman, 
every  inch  of  him — ventured  to  preach  a  sermon 
on  the  Duties  of  Royalty.  The  "Quarterly,"  "so 
savage  and  tartly,"  came  down  upon  him  in  the 
most  contemptuous  style,  as  "a  joker  of  jokes," 
a  "diner-out  of  the  first  water,"  in  one  of  his 
own  phrases;  sneering  at  him,  insulting  him,  as 
nothing  but  a  toady  of  a  court,  sneaking  behind 
the  anonymous,  would  ever  have  been  mean 
enough  to  do  to  a  man  of  his  position  and  gen- 
ius, or  to  any  decent  person  even. — If  I  were! 
giving  advice  to  a  young  fellow  of  talent,  with 
two  or  three  facts  to  his  mind,  I  would  tell  him  \ 
by  all  means  to  keep  his  wit  in  the  background  / 
until  after  he  had  made  a  reputation  by  his  more 
solid  qualities.  And  so  to  an  actor:  Hamlet 
first,  and  Bob  Logic  afterwards, if  you  like;  but 
don't  think,  as  they  say  poor  Liston  used  to, 
that  people  will  be  ready  to  allow  that  you  can 
do  anything  great  with  Macbeth' s  dagger  after 
flourishing  about  with  a  Paul  Pry' s  umbrella.  Do 
you  know,  too,  that  the  majority  of  men  look 
upon  all  who  challenge  their  attention, — for  a 
while, at  least, — as  beggars, and  nuisances?  They 
always  try  to  get  off  as  cheaply  as  they  can ;  and 
the  cheapest  of  all  things  they  can  give  a  literary 
man — pardon  the  forlorn  pleasantry! — is  the 
funny-bone.  That  is  all  very  well  so  far  as  it. 
goes,  but  satisfies  no  man,  and  makes  a  good 
many  angry,  as  I  told  you  on  a  former  occasion. 

"Oh,  indeed,  no! — I  am  not    ashamed  to 

make  you  laugh,  occasionally.     I  think  I  could 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     97 

read  you  something  I  have  in  my  desk  that  would 
probably  make  you  smile.  Perhaps  I  will  read 
it  one  of  these  days,  if  you  are  patient  with  me 
when  I  am  sentimental  and  reflective;  not  just 
now.  The  ludicrous  has  its  place  in  the  uni- 
verse; it  is  not  a  human  invention,  but  one  of 
the  Divine  ideas,  illustrated  in  the  practical 
jokes  of  kittens  and  monkeys  long  before  Aris- 
tophanes or  Shakespeare.  How  curious  it  is  that 
we  always  consider  solemnity  and  the  absence 
of  all  gay  surprises  and  encounter  of  wits  as  es- 
sential to  the  idea  of  the  future  life  of  those 
whom  we  thus  deprive  of  half  their  faculties  and 
then  called  blessed.  There  are  not  a  few  who, 
even  in  this  life,  seem  to  be  preparing  themselves 
for  that  smileless  eternity  to  which  they  look 
forward,  by  banishing  all  gayety  from  their  hearts 
and  all  joyousness  from  their  countenances.  I 
meet  one  such  in  the  street  not  unfrequently,  a 
person  of  intelligence  and  education,  but  who 
gives  me  (and  all  that  he  passes)  such  a  rayless 
and  chilling  look  of  recognition, — something  a 
if  he  were  one  of  Heaven's  assessors, come  down 
to  "doom"  every  acquaintance  he  met, — that  I 
have  sometimes  begun  to  sneeze  on  the  spot, 
and  gone  home  with  a  violent  cold,  dating  from 
that  instant.  I  don't  doubt  he  would  cut  his 
kitten's  tail  off.if  he  caught  her  playing  with  it. 
Please  tell  me,  who  taught  her  to  play  with  it? 

No.no! — give  me  a  chance  to  talk  to  you,  my 
fellow-boarders, and  you  need  not  be  afraid  that 
I  shall  have  any  scruples  about  entertaining 
you,  if  1  can  do  it,  as  well  as  giving  you  some 
of  my  serious  thoughts,  and  perhaps  my  sadder 


98   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

fancies.  I  know  nothing  in  English  or  any  other 
literature  more  admirable  ,fcfian  that  sentiment 
of  Sir  Thomas  Browned  "EVERY  MAN  TRULY 

LIVES, SO  LONG  AS  HE  ACTS  HIS  NATURE,   OR  SOME/''' 
WAY,  MAKES  GOOD  THE    FACULTIES  OF  HIMSELF^^ 

-I  finfHhr_  frrrnt  thing  in  thin  wfrrH  is  not 
much  wnere  we  stand,  as  in  what  direction 
*"^n-£_TnrrYirgi^  j>n  ra"tf%^n  t^-p^***  of  heaven, 
\ve  must  sail  sometimes  with  the  wind  and 
sometimes  against  it, — but  we  must  sail,  and 
not  drift,  nor  lie  at  anchor.  There  is  one  very 
sad  thing  in  old  friendships,  to  every  mind  that 
is  really  moving  onward.  It  is  this:  that  one 
cannot  help  using  his  early  friends  as  the  seaman 
uses  the  log,  to  mark  his  progress.  Every  now 
and  then  we  throw  an  old  schoolmate  over  the 
stern  with  a  string  of  thought  tied  to  him,  and 
look — I  am  afraid  with  a  kind  of  luxurious  and 
sanctimonious  compassion — to  see  the  rate  at 
which  the  string  reels  off,  while  he  lies  there  bob- 
bing up  and  down, poor  fellow!  and  we  are  dash- 
ing along  with  the  wite  foam  and  bright  sparkle 
at  our  bows; — the  ruffled  bosom  of  prosperity 
and  progress,  with  a  sprig  of  diamonds  stuck  in 
it.  But  this  is  only  the  sentimental  side'  of  the 
matter;  for  grow  we  must, if  we  outgrow  all  that 
we  love. 

Don't  misunderstand  that  metaphor  of  heaving 
the  log,  I  beg  you.  It  is  merely  a  smart  way 
of  saying  that  we  cannot  avoid  measuring  our 
rate  of  movement  by  those  with  whom  we  have 
long  been  in  the  habit  of  comparing  ourselves, 
and  when  they  once  become  stationary,  we  can 
get  our  reckoning  from  them  with  painful  ac- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     99 

curacy.  We  see  just  what  we  were  when  they 
were  our  peers,  and  can  strike  the  balance  be- 
tween that  and  whatever  we  may  feel  ourselves 
to  be  now.  No  doubt  we  may  sometimes  be 
mistaken.  If  we  change  our  last  simile  to  that 
very  old  and  familiar  one  of  a  fleet  leaving  the 
harbor  and  sailing  in  company  for  some  distant 
region,  we  can  get  what  we  want  out  of  it. 
There  is  one  of  our  companions; — her  streamers 
were  torn  into  rags  before  she  had  got  into  the 
open  sea,  then  by  and  by  her  sails  blew  out  of 
the  ropes  one  after  another,  the  waves  swept 
her  deck,  and  as  night  carne  on  we  left  her  a 
seeming  wreck, as  we  flew  under  our  pyramid  of 
canvas.  But  lo!  at  dawn  she  is  still  in  sight, — 
it  may  be  in  advance  of  us.  Some  deep  ocean- 
current  has  been  moving  her  on,  strong,  but 
silent, — yes,  stronger  than  these  noisy  winds 
that  puff  our  sails  until  they  are  swollen  as  the 
cheeks  of  jubilant  cherubim.  And  when  at  last 
the  black  steam-tug  with  the  skeleton  arms,  that 
comes  out  of  the  mist  sooner  or  later  and  takes 
us  all  in  tow,  grapples  her  and  goes  off  panting 
and  groaning  with  her.it  is  to  that  harbor  where 
all  wrecks  are  refitted,  and  where,  alas!  we, 
towering  in  our  pride,  may  never  come. 

So  you  will  not  think  I  mean  to  speak  lightly 
of  old  friendships,  because  we  cannot  help  insti- 
tuting comparisons  between  our  present  and  for- 
mer selves  by  the  aid  of  those  who  were  what 
we  were,  but  are  not  what  we  are.  Nothing 
strikes  one  more,  in  the  race  of  life,  than  to  see 
how  many  give  out  in  the  first  half  of  the  course. 
"Commencement  day"always  reminds  me  of  the  . 


IOO      THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE   BREAKFAST-TABLE 

start  for  the  "Derby,"  when  the  beautiful  high- 
bred three-year  olds  of  the  season  are  brought 
up  for  trial.  That  day  is  the  start,  and  life  is 
the  race.  Here  we  are  at  Cambridge,  and  a  class 
is  just  "graduating."  Poor  Harry!  he  was  to 
have  been  there  too,  but  he  has  paid  forfeit;  step 
out  here  into  the  grass  back  of  the  church;  ah! 
there  it  is:  — 

"HUNC   LAPIDEM   POSUERUNT 
SOCII    MCERENTES.  " 

But  this  is  the  start,  and  here  they  are, — 
coats  bright  as  silk,  and  manes  as  smooth  as 
eau  lustrale  can  make  them.  Some  of  the  best 
of  the  colts  are.  racing  round,  a  few  minutes 
each,  to  show  their  paces.  What  is  that  old 
gentleman  crying  about?  and  the  old  lady  by 
him,  and  the  three  girls,  all  covering  their  eyes 
for?  Oh,  that  is  their  colt  that  has  just  been 
trotted  up  on  the  stage.  Do  they  really  think 
those  little  thin  legs  can  do  anything  in  such  a 
slashing  sweepstakes  as  is  coming  off  in  these 
next  forty  years?  Oh,  this  terrible  gift  of  sec- 
ond sight  that  comes  to  some  of  us  when  we  be- 
gin to  look  through  the  silvered  rings  of  the 
arcus  senilis! 

Ten  years  gone.  First  turn  in  the  race. 
A  few  broken  down;  two  or  three  bolted.  Sev- 
eral show  in  advance  of  the  ruck.  Cassock,  a 
black  colt,  seems  to  be  ahead  of  the  rest;  those 
black  colts  commonly  get  the  start,  I  have 
noticed,  oi  the  others,  in  the  first  quarter. 
Meteor  has  pulled  up. 

Twenty  years.  Second  corner  turned.  Cas- 
sock has  dropped  from  the  front,  and  Jndex,  an 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   IO1 

iron-gray, has  the  lead.  But  look!  how  they 
have-thinned  out!  Down  flat, — five, — six, — 
how  many?  They  lie  still  enough!  they  will 
not  get  up  again  in  this  race, be  very  sure!  And 
the  rest  of  them,  what  a  "tailing  off!"  Anybody 
can  see  who  is  going  to  win, — perhaps. 

Thirty  years.  Third  corner  turned.  Dives, 
bright  sorrel,  ridden  by  the  fellow  in  a  yellow 
jacket,  begins  to  make  play  fast;  is  getting  to 
be  the  favorite  with  many.  But  who  is  that 
other  one  that  has  been  lengthening  his  stride 
from  the  first,  and  now  shows  close  up  to  the 
front?  Don't  you  remember  the  quiet  brown 
colt  Asterotd,vi'\\.}\  the  star  in  his  forehead?  That 
is  he;  he  is  one  of  the  sort  that  lasts;  look  out 
for  him!  The  black  ucolt,"  as  we  used  to  call 
him,  is  in  the  background,  taking  it  easy  in  a 
gentle  trot.  There  is  one  they  used  to  call  the 
Filly,  on  account  of  a  certain  feminine  air  he 
had;  well  up,  you  see;  the  Filly  is  not  to  be 
dispised,  my  boy! 

Forty  years.  More  dropping  off, — but  places 
much  as  before. 

Fifty  years.  Race  over.  All  that  are  on  the 
course  are  coming  in  at  a  walk;  no  more  run- 
ning. Who  is  ahead?  Ahead?  What!  and  the 
winning  post  a  slab  of  white  or  gray  stone  stand- 
ing out  from  that  turf  where  there  is  no  more 
jockeying  or  straining  for  victory!  Well,  the 
world  marks  their  places  in  its  betting-book; 
but  be  sure  that  these  matter  very  little,  if  they 
have  run  as  well  as  they  knew  how! 

— Did  I  not  say  to  you   a   little    while  ago 
that  the  universe  swam  in  an  ocean  of  similitudes 


102    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

and  analogies?  I  will  not  quote  Cowley,  or 
Burns,  or  Wordsworth,  just  now,  to  show  you 
what  thoughts  were  suggested  to  them  by  the 
simplest  natural  objects,  such  as  a  flower  or  a 
leaf;  but  I  will  read  you  a  few  lines,  if  you  do 
not  object,  suggested  by  looking  at  a  section  of 
one  of  those  chambered  shells  to  which  is  given 
the  name  of  Pearly  Nautilus.  We  need  not 
trouble  ourselves  about  the  distinction  between 
this  and  the  Paper  Nautilus,  the  Argonauta  of 
the  ancients.  The  name  applied  to  both  shows 
that  each  has  long  been  compared  to  a  ship,  as 
you  may  see  more  fully  in  Webster's  Dictionary, 
or  the  "Encyclopedia,"  to  which  he  refers.  If 
you  will  look  into  Roget's  Bridgewater  Treatise, 
you  will  find  a  figure  of  one  of  these  shells,  and 
a  section  of  it.  The  last  will  show  you  the  series 
of  enlarging  compartments  successively  dwelt 
in  by  the  animal  that  inhabits  the  shell,  which 
is  built  in  a  winding  spiral.  Can  you  find  no 
lesson  in  this? 

THE  CHAMBERED  NAUTILUS. 
This  is  the  ship  of  pearl,  which,  poets  feign, 

Sails  the  unshadowed  main, — 

The  venturous  bark  that  flings 
On  the  sweet  summer  wind  its  purpled  wings 
In  gulfs  enchanted,  where  the  siren  sings, 

And  coral  reefs  lie  bare, 
Where  the  cold  sea-maids  rise  to  sun  their  streaming  hair. 

Its  webs  of  living  gauze  no  more  unfurl; 

Wrecked  is  the  ship  of  pearl! 

And  every  chambered  cell, 

Where  its  dim  dreaming  life  was  wont  to  dwell 
As  the  frail  tenant  shaped  his  growing  shell, 

Before  thee  lies  revealed, — 
Its  irised  ceiling  rent,  its  sunless  crypt  unsealed! 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   103 

Year  after  year  beheld  the  silent  toil 

That  spread  his  lustrous  coil; 

Still,  as  the  spiral  grew, 
He  left  the  past  year's  dwelling  for  the  new, 

Built  up  its  idle  door, 
Stretched  in  his  last-found  home,  and  knew  the  old  no  more. 

Thanks  for  the  heavenly  message  brought  by  thee, 

Child  of  the  wandering  sea, 

Cast  from  her  lap,  forlorn! 
From  thy  dead  lips  a  clearer  note  is  born 
Than  ever  Triton  blew  from  wreathed  horn! 

While  on  mine  ear  it  rings, 
Through  the  deep  caves  of  thought  I  hear  a  voice  that  sings: — 

Build  thee  more  stately  mansions,  O  my  soul, 

As  the  swift  seasons  roll! 

Leave  thy  low-vaulted  past! 
Let  each  new  temple,  nobler  than  the  last, 
Shut  thee  from  heaven  with  a  dome  more  vast, 

Till  thou  at  length  art  free, 
Leaving  thine  outgrown  shell  by  life's  unresting  sea! 


V. 


A  Lyric  conception — my  friend,  the  Poet, said 
— hits  me  like  a  bullet  in  the  forehead.  I  have 
often  had  the  blood  drop  from  my  cheeks  when 
it  struck,  and  felt  that  I  turned  as  white  as 
death.  Then  comes  a  creeping  as  of  centipedes 
running  down  the  spine, — then  a  gasp  and  a 
great  jump  of  the  heart, — then  a  sudden  flush 
and  a  beating  in  the  vessels  of  the  head, — then 
a  long  sigh, — and  the  poem  is  written. 

It  is  an  impromptu,  I  suppose,  then,  if  you 
write  it  so  suddenly, — I  replied. 


104   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

No, — said  he, — far  from  it.  I  said  written, 
but  I  did  not  say  copied.  Every  such  poem 
has  a  soul  and  a  body,  and  it  is  the  body  of  it, 
or  the  copy,  that  men  read  and  publishers  pay 
for.  The  soul  of  it  is  born  in  an  instant  in  the 
poet's  soul.  It  comes  to  him  a  thought,  tangled 
in  the  meshes  of  a  few  sweet  words, — words 
that  have  loved  each  other  from  the  cradle  of 
the  language, but  have  never  been  wedded  until 
now.  Whether  it  will  ever  fully  embody  itself 
in  a  bridal  train  of  a  dozen  stanzas  or  not  is  un- 
certain; but  it  exists  potentially  from  the  in- 
stant that  the  poet  turns  pale  with  it.  It  is 
enough  to  stun  and  scare  anybody,  to  have  a 
hot  thought  come  crashing  into  his  brain,  and 
ploughing  up  those  parrallel  ruts  where  the 
wagon  trains  of  common  ideas  were  jogging 
along  in  their  regular  sequences  of  association. 
No  wonder  the  ancients  made  the  poetical 
impulse  wholly  external.  Mfytv  att8s  #ed- 
Goddess, — Muse, — divine  afflatus,  something 
outside  always.  /  never  wrote  any  verses  worth 
reading.  I  can't.  I  am  too  stupid.  If  I  ever 
copied  any  that  were  worth  reading,  I  was  only 
a  medium. 

[I  was  talking  all  this  time  to  our  boarders, 
you  understand,  telling  them  what  this  poet 
told  me.  The  company  listened  rather  atten- 
tively, I  thought,  considering  the  literary  char- 
acter of  the  remarks.] 

The  old  gentleman  opposite  all  at  once  asked 
me  if  I  ever  read  anything  better  than  Pope's 
"Essay  on  Man?"  Had  I  ever  perused  McFin- 
gal  ?  He  was  fond  of  poetry  when  he  was  a 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   105 

boy,— his  mother  taught  him  to  say  many  little 
pieces, — he  remembered  one  beautiful  hymn; — 
and  the  old  gentleman  began,  in  a  clear,  loud 
voice,  for  his  years, — 

"The  spacious  firmament  on  high, 
With  all  the  blue  ethereal  sky, 
And  spangled  heavens," 

He  stopped,  as  if  startled  by  our  silence,  and 
a  faint  flush  ran  up  beneath  the  thin  white  hairs 
that  fell  upon  his  cheek.  As  I  looked  round,  I 
was  reminded  of  a  show  I  once  saw  at  the  Mu- 
seum,— the  Sleeping  Beauty,!  think  they  called 
it.  The  old  man's  sudden  breaking  out  in  this 
way  turned  every  face  toward  him,  and  each 
kept  his  posture  as  if  changed  to  stone.  Oar 
Celtic  Bridget,  or  Biddy,  is  not  a  foolish  fat 
scullion  to  burst  out  crying  for  a  sentiment  She 
is  of  the  serviceable,  red-handed,  broad-and- 
high-shouldered  type;  one  of  those  imported 
female  servants  who  are  known  in  public  by 
their  amorphous  style  of  person, their  stoop  for- 
ward, and  a  headlong  and  as  it  were  precipitous 
walk, — the  waist  plunging  downwards  into  the 
rocking  pelvis  at  every  heavy  footfall.  Bridget, 
constituted  for  action,  not  for  emotion,  was  about 
to  deposit  a  plate  heaped  with  something  upon 
the  table,  when  I  saw  the  coarse  arm  stretched 
by  my  shoulder  arrested, — motionless  as  the 
arm  of  a  terra-cotta  caryatid;  she  couldn't  set 
the  plate  down  while  the  old  gentleman  was 
speaking! 

He  was  quite  silent  after  this,  still  wearing 
the  slight  flush  on  his  cheek.  Don't  ever  think 
the  poetry  is  dead  in  an  old  man  because  his 


IO6    THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

forehead  is  wrinkled,  or  that  his  manhood  has 
left  him  when  his  hand  trembles!  If  they  ever 
were  there,  they  are  there  still! 

By  and  by  we  got  talking  again. Does  a 

poet  love  the  verses  written  through  him,  do 
you  think,  Sir? — said  the  divinity-student. 

So  long  as  they  are  warm  from  his  mind, 
carry  any  of  his  animal  heat  about  them,  I 
know  he  loves  them, — I  answered.  When  they 
have  had  time  to  cool,  he  is  more  indifferent. 

A  good  deal  as  it  is  with  buckwheat  cakes, 
— said  the  young  fellow  whcm  they  call  John. 

The  last  words,  only,  reached  the  ear  of  the 
economically  organized  female  in  black  bomba- 
zine.  Buckwheat  is  skerce  and  high, — she 

remarked.  [Must  be  a  poor  relation  sponging  on 
our  landlady, — pays  nothing,  — so  she  must  stand 
by  the  guns  and  be  ready  to  repel  boarders.] 

I  liked  the  turn  the  conversation  had  taken,  for 
I  had  some  things  I  wanted  to  say,  and  so,  after 
waiting  a  minute,!  began  again. — I  don't  think 
the  poems  I  read  you  sometimes  can  be  fairly 
appreciated,  given  to  you  as  they  are  in  the 
green  state. 

_— — — You  don't  know  what  I  mean  by  the 
green  state?  Well,  then,  I  will  tell  you.  Certain 
things  are  goodfo£  nothing  until  they  have  been 
kept  a  long  while;  and  some  are  good  for  noth- 
ing until  they  have  been  long  kept  and  used. 
Of  the  first,  wine  is  the  illustrious  and  immortal 
example.  Of  those  which  must  be  kept  and  used 
I  will  name  three, — meerschaum  pipes,  violins, 
and  poems.  The  meerschaum  is  but  a  poor  affair 
until  it  has  burned  a  thousand  offerings  to  the 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   107 

cloud-compelling  deities.  It  comes  to  us  with- 
out complexion  or  flavor, — born  of  the  sea- 
foam,  like  Aphrodite,  but  colorless  as  pallida 
Mars  herself.  The  fire  is  lighted  in  its  central 
shrine,  and  gradually  the  juices  which  the  broad 
leaves  of  the  Great  Vegetable  had  sucked  up 
from  an  acre  and  curdled  into  a  drachm  are 
diffused  through  its  thirsting  pores.  First  a  dis- 
coloration, then  a  stain,  and  at  last  a  rich, 
glowing,  umber  tint  spreading  over  the  whole 
surface.  Nature  true  to  her  old  brown  autumnal 
hue,  you  see, — as  true  in  the  fire  of  the  meer- 
schaum as  in  the  sunshine  of  October!  And 
then  the  cumulative  wealth  of  its  fragrant  rem- 
iniscences! he  who  inhales  its  vapors  takes  a 
thousand  whiffs  in  a  single  breath;  and  one  can- 
not touch  it  without  awakening  the  old  joys  that 
hang  around  it,  as  the  smell  of  flowers  clings  to 
the  dresses  of  the  daughters  of  the  house  of 
Farina! 

[Don't  think  I  use  a  meerschaum  myself,  for 
/  do  not,  though  I  have  owned  a  calumet  since 
my  childhood,  which  from  a  naked  Pict  (of  the 
Mohawk  species)  my  grandsire  won,  together 
with  a  tomahawk  and  beaded  knife-sheath;  pay- 
ing for  the  lot  with  a  bullet-mark  on  his  right 
cheek.  On  the  maternal  side  I  inherit  the  loveli- 
est silver-mounted  tobacco-stopper  you  ever 
saw.  It  is  a  little  box-wood  Triton,  carved 
with  charming  liveliness  and  truth;  I  have  often 
compared  it  to  a  figure  in  Raphael's  "Triumph 
of  Galatea."  It  came  to  me  in  an  ancient  sha- 
green case, — how  old  it  is  I  do  not  know, — but 
it  must  have  been  made  since  Sir  Walter  Ra- 


108   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

leigh's  time.  If  you  are  curious,  you  shall  see 
it  any  day.  Neither  will  I  pretend  that  I  am 
so  unused  to  the  more  perishable  smoking  con- 
trivances, that  a  few  whiffs  would  make  me  feel 
as  if  I  lay  in  a  ground-swell  on  the  Bay  of  Bis- 
cay. I  am  not  unacquainted  with  that  fusiform, 
spiral-wound  bundle  of  chopped  stems  and  mis- 
•>.  jbellaneous  incombustibles,  the  cigar,  so  called, 
Nof  the  shops, — which  to  "draw"  asks  the  suction- 
power  of  a  nursling  infant  Hercules,  and  to  rel- 
ish, the  leathery  palate  of  an  old  Silenus.  I  do 
not  advise  you,  young  man,  even  if  my  illustra- 
tion strikes  your  fancy,  to  consecrate  the  flower 
of  your  life  to  painting  the  bowl  of  a  pipe,  for 
let  me  assure  you,  the  stain  of  a  reverie-breeding 
narcotic  may  strike  deeper  than  you  think  for. 
I  have  seen  the  green  leaf  of  early  promise  grow 
•'  brown  before  its  time  under  such  Nicotian  regi- 
men, and  thought  the  umbered  meerschaum  was 
dearly  bought  at  the  cost  of  a  brain  enfeebled 
and  a  will  enslaved  ] 

Violins,  too, — the  sweet  old  Amati!—  the  divine 
Stradjyarius!  Played  on  by  ancient  maestros 
un^iTthe~b~oWHiand  lost  its  power  and  the  flying 
fingers  stiffened.  Bequeathed  to  the  passionate 
young  enthusiast,  who  made  it  whisper  his  hidden 
love,  and  cry  bis  inarticulate  longings,  and 
scream  his  untold  agonies,  and  wail  his  monot- 
onous despair.  Passed  from  his  dying  head  to 
the  cold  virtuoso,  who  let  it  slumber  in  its  case 
for  a  generation,  till,  when  his  hoard  was  broken 
up,  it  came  forth  once  more  and  rode  the  stormy 
symphonies  of  royal  orchestras,  beneath  the 
rushing  bow  of  their  lord  and  leader.  Into  lonely 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   1 09 

prisons  with  improvident  artists;  into  convents 
from  which  arose, day  and  night, the  holy  hymns 
with  which  its  tones  were  blended;  and  back 
again  to  orgies  in  which  it  learned  to  howl  and 
laugh  as  if  a  legion  of  devils  were  shut  up  in  it; 
then  again  to  the  gentle  dilettante  who  calmed 
it  down  with  easy  melodies  until  it  answered 
him  softly  as  in  the  days  of  the  old  maestro*. 
And  so  given  into  our  hands,  its  pores  all  full 
of  music;  stained,  like  the  meerschaum, through 
and  through,  with  the  concentrated  hue  and 
sweetness  of  all  the  harmonies  that  have  kindled 
and  faded  on  its  strings. 

Nov/  I  tell  you  a  poem  must  be  kept  and  used^  / 
like  a  meerschaum,  or  a  violin.  A  poem  is  just 
as  porous  as  the  meerschaum; — the  more  porous 
it  is,  the  better.  I  mean  to  say  that  a  genuine 
poem  is  capable  of  absorbing  an  indefinite 
amount  of  the  essence  of  our  own  humanity, — 
its  tenderness,  its  heroism,  its  regrets,  its  aspi- 
rations, so  as  to  be  gradually  stained  through 
with  a  divine  secondary  color  derived  from  our- 
selves. So  you  see  it  must  take  time  to  bring 
the  senti-ment  of  a  poem  into  harmony  with  our 
nature,  by  staining  ourselves  through  every 
thought  and  image  our  being  can  penetrate. 

Then  again  as  to  the  mere  music  of  a  new 
poem;  why, who  can  expect  anything  more  from 
that  than  from  the  music  of  a  violin  fresh  from 
the  maker's  hands?  Now  you  know  very  well 
that  there  are  no  less  than  fifty-eight  different 
pieces  in  a  violin.  These  pieces  are  strangers 
to  each  other,  and  it  takes  a  century,  more  or 
less,  to  make  them  thoroughly  acquainted.  At 


110   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

last  they  learn  to  vibrate  in  harmony,  and  the 
instrument  becomes  an  organic  whole,  as  if  it 
were  a  great  seed  capsule  that  had  grown  from 
a  garden-bed  in  Cremona,  or  elsewhere.  Be- 
sides, the  wood  is  juicy  and  full  of  sap  for  fifty 
years  or  so,  but  at  the  end  of  fifty  or  a  hundred 
more  gets  tolerably  dry  and  comparatively  res- 
onant. 

Don't  you  see  that  all  this  is  just  as  true  of  a 
poem?  Counting  each  word  as  a  piece,  there 
are  more  pieces  in  an  average  copy  of  verses 
than  in  a  violin.  The  poet  has  forced  all  these 
words  together,  and  fastened  them,  and  they 
don't  understand  it  at  first.  But  let  the  poem 
be  repeated  aloud  and  murmured  over  in  the 
mind's  muffled  whisper  often  enough,  and  at 
length  the  parts  become  knit  together  in  such 
absolute  solidarity  that  you  could  not  change  a 
syllable  without  the  whole  world's  crying  out 
against  you  for  meddling  with  the  harmonious 
fabric.  Observe,  too,  how  the  drying  process 
takes  place  in  the  stuff  of  a  poem  just  as  in  that 
of  a  violin.  Here  is  a  Tyrolese  fiddle  that  is 
just  coming  to  its  hundredth  birthday,  —  (Pedro 
Klauss,  Tyroli,  fecit,  1760), — the  sap  is  pretty 
well  out  of  it.  And  here  is  the  song  of  an  old 
poet  whom  Neaera  cheated:  — 

"Nox  erat,  et  ccelo  fulgebat  Luna  sereno 

Inter  minora  sidera, 

Cum  tu  magnorum  numen  laesura  deorum 
In  verba  jurabas  mea." 

Don't  you  perceive  the  sonorousness  of  these 
old  dead  Latin  phrases?  Now  I  tell  you  that 
every  word  fresh  from  the  dictionary  brings 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   III 

with  it  a  certain  succulence;  and  though  I  can- 
not expect  the  sheets  of  the  "Pactolian,"  in 
which,  as  I  told  you,  I  sometimes  print  my 
verses,  to  get  so  dry  as  the  crisp  papyrus  that 
held  those  words  of  Horatius  Flaccus,  yet  you 
may  be  sure,  that,  while  the  sheets  are  damp, 
and  while  the  lines  hold  their  sap,  you  can't 
fairly  judge  of  my  performances,  and  that, 
made  of  the  true  stunythey  will  ring  better  after 
^aJW_hile/I 

[There  was  silence  for  a  brief  space,  after 
my  somewhat  elaborate  exposition  of  these 
self-evident  analogies.  Presently  a  person 
turned  toward  me — I  do  not  choose  to  desig- 
nate the  individual — and  said  that  he  rather  ex 
pected  my  pieces  had  given  pretty  good  "sahtis- 
fahction." — I  had,  up  to  this  moment,  considered 
this  complimentary  phrase  as  sacred  to  the  use 
of  secretaries  of  lyceums,  and,  as  it  has  been 
usually  accompanied  by  a  small  pecuniary  testi- 
monial, have  acquired  a  certain  relish  for  this 
moderately  tepid  and  unstimulating  expression 
of  enthusiasm.  But  as  a  reward  for  gratuitous 
services,!  confess  I  thought  it  a  little  below  that 
blood-heated  standard  which  a  man's  breath 
ought  to  have,  whether  silent,  or  vocal  and  artic- 
ulate. I  waited  for  a  favorable  opportunity, 
however,  before  making  the  remarks  which  fol- 
low.] 

There  are  single    expressions,  as    I  have 

told  you  already,  that  fix  a  man's  position  for 
you  before  you  have  done  shaking  hands  with 
him.  Allow  me  to  expand  a  little.  There  are 
"*weral  things,  very  slight  in  themselves,  yet  im- 


112   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

plying  other  things  not  so  unimportant.  Thus, 
your  French  servant  has  dtvalist  your  premises 
and  got  caught.  Excuses,  says  the  sergent-de- 
ville,  as  he  politely  relieves  him  of  his  upper 
garments  and  displays  his  bust  in  the  full  day- 
light. Good  shoulders  enough, — a  little  marked, 
— traces  of  smallpox,  perhaps, — but  white. 

Crac!  from  the  sergent-de-villi s  broad 
palm  on  the  white  shoulder!  Now  look!  Vogue 
la  galere!  Out  comes  the  big  red  V — mark  of 
the  hot  iron;— he  had  blistered  it  out  pretty 
nearly,— hadn't  he?- the  old  rascal  VOLEUR, 
branded  in  the  galleys  at  Marseilles!  [Don't! 
What  if  he  has  got  something  like  this? — no- 
body supposes  I  invented  such  a  story.] 

My  man  John, who  used  to  drive  two  of  those 
six  equine  females  \\hich  I  told  you  I  had  owned, 
—  for,  look  you,  my  friends,  simple  though  I 
stand  here,  I  am  one  that  has  been  driven  in 
his  "kerridge,"— not  using  that  term,  as  liberal 
shepherds  do,  for  any  battered  old  shabby-gen- 
teel go-cart  that  has  more  than  one  wheel,  but 
meaning  thereby  a  four-wheeled  vehicle  with  a 
pole, —  my  man  John,  I  say,  was  a  retired  sol- 
dier. He  retired  unostentatiously,  as  many  of 
Her  Majesty's  modest  servants  have  done  before 
and  since.  John  told  me,  that  when  an  officer 
thinks  he  recognizes  one  of  these  retiring  heroes, 
and  would  know  if  he  has  really  been  in  the 
service,  that  he  may  restore  him,  if  possible, to 
a  grateful  country, he  comes  suddenly  upon  him. 
and  says, sharply,  "Stiap!"  If  he  has  ever  worn 
the  shoulder-strap,  he  has  learned  the  reprimand 
for  its  ill  adjustment.  The  old  word  of  com- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    113 

mand  flashes  through  his  muscles,  and  his  hand 
goes  up  in  an  instant  to  the  place  where  the 
strap  used  to  be. 

[I  was  all  the  time  preparing  for  my  grand 
coup,  you  understand;  but  I  saw  they  were  not 
quite  ready  for  it,  and  so  continued, — always  in 
illustration  of  the  general  principle  I  had  laid 
down.] 

Yes,  odd  things  come  out  in  ways  that  nobody 
thinks  of.  There  was  a  legend,  that,  when  the 
Danish  pirates  made  descents  upon  the  English 
coast,  they  caught  a  few  Tartars  occasionally,  in 
the  shape  of  Saxons,  that  would  not  let  them  go, 
— on  the  contrary,  insisted  on  their  staying,  and, 
to  make  sure  of  it,  treated  them  as  Apollo  treated 
Marsyas,  or  as  Bartholinus  has  treated  a  fellow- 
creature  in  his  title-page,  and,  having  divested 
them  of  the  one  essential  and  perfectly  fitting 
garment,  indispensable  in  the  mildest  climates, 
nailed  the  same  on  the  church-door  as  we  do 
the  bans  of  marriage,  in  terrorem. 

[There  was  a  laugh  at  this  among  some  of  the 
young  folks;  but  as  I  looked  at  our  landlady,  I 
saw  that  "the  water  stood  in  her  eyes,"  as  it  did 
in  Christiana's  when  the  interpreter  asked  her 
about  the  spider,  and  that  the  schoolmistress 
blushed,  as  Mercy  did  in  the  same  conversation, 
as  you  remember.] 

That  sounds  like  a  cock-and-bull-story, — said 
the  young  fellow  whom  they  call  John.  I 
abstained  from  making  Hamlet's  remark  to 
Horatio,  and  continued. 

Not  long  since,  the  church-wardens  were  re- 
pairing and  beautifying  an  old  Saxon  church  in 


114   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

a  certain  English  village,  and  among  other  things 
thought  the  doors  should  be  attended  to.  One 
of  them  particularly,  the  front-door,looked  very 
badly,  crusted,  as  it  were,  and  as  if  it  would  be 
all  the  better  for  scraping.  There  happened  to 
be  a  microscopist  in  the  village  who  had  heard 
the  old  pirate  story,  and  he  took  it  into  his  head 
to  examine  the  crust  on  this  door.  There  was 
no  mistake  about  it;  it  was  a  genuine  historical 
document,  of  the  Ziska  drum-head  pattern,— a 
real  cutis  humana,  stripped  from  some  old  Scan- 
dinavian filibuster,  —  and  the  legend  was  true. 
My  friend,  the  Professor,  settled  an  impor- 
tant historical  and  financial  question  once  by  the 
aid  of  an  exceedingly  minute  fragment  of  a 
similar  document.  Behind  the  pane  of  plate- 
glass  which  boie  his  name  and  title  burnt  a 
modest  lamp,  signifying  to  the  passers-by  that 
at  all  hours  of  the  night  the  slightest  favors  (or 
fevers)  were  welcome.  A  youth  who  had  freely 
partaken  of  the  cup  which  cheers  and  likewise 
inebriates,  following  a  moth-like  impulse  very 
natural  under  the  circumstances,  dashed  his  fist 
at  the  light  and  quenched  the  meek  luminary, — 
breaking  through  the  plate-glass,  of  course,  to 
reach  it.  Now  I  don't  want  to  go  into  minutics 
at  table,  you  know,  but  a  naked  hand  can  no 
more  go  through  a  pane  of  thick  glass  without 
leaving  some  of  its  cuticle,  to  say  the  least,  be- 
hind it,  than  a  butterfly  can  go  through  a  sausage- 
machine  without  looking  the  worse  for  it.  The 
Professor  gathered  up  the  fragments  of  glass, 
and  with  them  certain  very  minute  but  entirely 
satisfactory  documents  which  would  have  iden- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   115 

tified  and  hanged  any  rogue  in  Christendom 
who  had  parted  with  them. — The  historical 
question.  Who  did  it?  and  the  financial  question, 
Who  paid  for  it?  were  both  settled  before  the 
new  lamp  was  lighted  the  next  evening. 

You  see,  my  friends,  what  immense  conclu- 
sions, touching  our  lives,  our  fortunes,  and  our 
sacred  honor,  may  be  reached  by  means  of  very 
insignificant  premises.  This  is  eminently  true 
of  manners  and  forms  of  speech;  a  movement  or 
a  phrase  often  tells  you  all  you  want  to  know 
about  a  person.  Thus,  "How's  your  health?" 
(commonly  pronounced  haaltJi}^ — instead  of, 
How  do  you  do?  or,  How  are  you?  Or  calling 
your  little  dark  entry  a  "hall,"  and  your  old 
rickety  one-horse  wagon  a  "kerridge."  Or  tell- 
ing a  person  who  has  been  trying  to  please  you 
that  he  has  given  you  pretty  good  "sahtisfahc- 
tion."  Or  saying  that  you  "remember  of"  such 
a  thing,  or  that  you  have  been  "stoppin'"  at 
Deacon  Somebody's, — and  other  such  expres- 
sions. One  of  my  friends  had  a  little  marble 
statuette  of  Cupid  in  the  parlor  of  his  country 
house, — bow,  arrow,  wings,  and  all  complete. 
A  visitor,  indigenous  to  the  region,  looking  pen- 
sively at  the  figure,  asked  the  lady  of  the  house 
"if  that  was  a  statoo  of  her  deceased  infant?" 
What  a  delicious, though  somewhat  voluminous 
biography,  social,  educational,  and  aesthetic  in 
that  brief  question! 

[Please  observe  with  what  Machiavelian  astute- 
ness I  smuggled  in  the  particular  offense  which 
it  was  my  object  to  hold  up  to  my  fellow- 
boarders,  without  too  personal  an  attack  on  the 
individual  at  whose  door  it  lay. 


Il6   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

That  was  an  exceedingly  dull  person  who 
made  the  remark,  Ex  pcde  Herculem.  He 
might  as  well  have  said, "From  a  peck  of  apples 
you  may  judge  of  the  barrel."  Ex  PEDE,  to  be 
sure!  Read,  instead,  Ex  ungue  minimi  digiti 
pedis,  Herculem,  ej usque  pcitrcm,  uiatrem, 
avos  et  proaiws,  filios,  nepotes  et  pronepotes! 
Talk  to  me  about  your  3o$  -ou  <r~a>\  Tell  me 
about  Cuvier's  getting  up  a  megatherium  from  a 
tooth,  or  Agassiz's  drawing  a  portrait  of  an  un- 
discovered fish  from  a  single  scale!  As  the  "O" 
revealed  Giotto, — as  the  one  word"moi"betrayed 
the  S'ratford-atte-Bowe-taught  Anglais, —  so  all 
a  man's  antecedents  and  possibilities  are 
summed  up  in  a  single  utterance  which  gives  at 
once  the  gauge  of  his  education  and  his  mental 
organization. 

Possibilities,  Sir? — said  the  divinity-student; 
can't  a  man  who  saysHaoiv?  arrive  at  distinc- 
tion ? 

Sir, — I  replied, — in  a  republic  all  things  are  f 
possible.  But  the  man  with  a  future  has  almost 
of  necessity  sense  enough  to  see  that  any  odious 
trick  of  speech  or  manners  must  be  got  rid  of. 
Doesn't  Sidney  Smith  say  that  a  public  man  in  ; 
England  never  gets  over  a  false  quantity  uttered 
in  early  life?  Our  public  men  are  in  little  dan- 
ger of  this  fatal  misstep,  as  few  of  them  are  in 
the  habit  of  introducing  Latin  into  their 
speeches, — for  good  and  sufficient  reasons.  But 
they  are  bound  to  speak  decent  English,  — un- 
less, indeed,  they  are  rough  old  compaigners, 
like  General  Jackson  or  General  Taylor;  in 
which  case,  a  few  scars  on  Priscian's  head  are 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    117 

pardoned  to  old  fellows  that  have  quite  as  many 
on  their  own,  and  a  constituency  of  thirty  em- 
pires is  not  at  all  particular,  provided  they  do 
not  swear  in  their  Presidential  Messages. 

However,  it  is  not  for  me  to  talk.  I  have 
made  mistakes  enough  in  conversation  and  print. 
"Don't"  for  doesn't, — base  misspelling  of  Clos 
Vougeot  (I  wish  I  saw  the  label  on  the  bottle  a 
littis  oftensr), — and  I  don't  know  how  many 
more.  I  never  find  them  out  until  they  are 
stereotyped,  and  then  I  think  they  rarely  escape 
rre.  I  have  no  doubt  I  shall  make  half  a  dozen 
slips  before  this  breakfast  is  over,  and  remember 
them  all  before  another.  How  one  does  tremble 
with  rage  at  his  own  intense  momentary  stu- 
pidity about  things  he  knows  perfectly  well,  and 
to  think  how  he  lays  himself  open  to  the  imper- 
tinences of  the  captatores  verborum,  those  use- 
ful but  humble  scavengers  of  the  language, 
whose  business  it  is  to  pick  up  what  might  offend 
or  injure,  and  remove  it,  hugging  and  feeding 
on  it  as  they  go?  I  don't  want  to  speak  too 
slightingly  of  these  verbal  critics; — how  can  I, 
who  am  so  fond  of  talking  about  errors  and  vul- 
garisms of  speech?  Only  there  is  a  difference 
between  those  clerical  blunders  which  almost 
every  man  commits,  knowing  better,  and  that 
habitual  gros^ness  or  meanness  of  speech  which 
is  unendurable  to  educated  persons,  from  any- 
body that  wears  silk  or  broadcloth. 

[I  write  down  the  above  remarks  this  morning, 
January  26th,  making  this  record  of  the  date 
that  nobody  may  think  it  was  written  in  wrath, 
on  account  of  any  particular  grievance  suffered 


Il8  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

from  the  invasion  of  any  individual  scarab&us 
grammaticus.  ] 

1  wonder  if  anybody  ever  finds  fault  with 

anything  I  say  at  this  table  when  it  is  repeated? 
I  hope  they  do,  I  am  sure,  I  should  be  very 
certain  that  I  had  said  nothing  of  much  signifi- 
cance, if  they  did  not. 

Did  you  never,  in  walking  in  the  fields,  come 
across  a  large  flat  stone,  which  had  lain,  nobody 
knows  how  long,  just  where  you  found  it,  with 
the  grass  forming  a  little  hedge,  as  it  were,  all 
round  it,  close  to  its  edges, — and  have  you  not, 
in  obedience  to  a  kind  of  feeling  that  tcld  you 
it  had  been  lying  there  long  enough,  insinuated 
your  stick  or  your  foot  or  your  fingers  under  its 
edge  and  turned  it  over  as  a  housewife  turns  a 
cake, when  she  says  to  herself,"It's  done  brown 
enough  by  this  time?"  What  an  odd  revela- 
tion, and  what  an  unforeseen  and  unpleasant 
surprise  to  a  small  community,  the  very  exist- 
ence of  which  you  have  not  suspected,  until  the 
sudden  dismay  and  scattering  among  its  mem- 
bers produced  by  your  turning  the  old  stone 
over!  Blades  of  grass  flattened  down,  color- 
less, matted  together,  as  if  they  had  been 
bleached  and  ironed;  hideous  crawling  creatures, 
some  of  them  coleopterous  or  horny-shelled, — 
turtle-bugs  one  wants  to  call  them;  some  of  them 
softer,  but  cunningly  spread  out  and  compressed 
like  Lepine  watches  (Nature  never  loses  a 
crack  or  a  crevice,  mind  you,  or  a  joint  in  a 
tavern  bedstead,  but  she  always  has  one  of  her 
flat-pattern  live  timekeepers  to  slide  into  it) ; 
black,  glossy  crickets,  with  their  long  filaments 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE   BREAKFAST-TABLE        IIQ 

sticking  out  like  the  whips  of  four-horse  stage- 
coaches; motionless,  slug-like  creatures,  larvae, 
perhaps,  more  horrible  in  their  pulpy  stillness 
than  even  in  the  infernal  wriggle  of  maturity! 
But  no  sooner  is  the  stone  turned  and  the  whole- 
some light  of  day  let  in  upon  this  compressed  and 
blinded  community  of  creeping  things,  than  all 
of  them  that  enjoy  the  luxury  of  legs — and  some 
of  them  have  a  good  many — rush  round  wildly, 
butting  each  other  and  everything  in  their  way, 
and  end  in  a  general  stampede  for  underground 
retreats  from  the  region  poisoned  by  sunshine. 
Next  year  you  will  find  the  grass  growing  tall 
and  green  where  the  stone  lay;  the  ground-bird 
builds  her  nest  where  the  beetle  had  his  hole;  the 
dandelion  and  the  buttercup  are  growing  there, 
and  the  broad  fans  of  insect-angels  open  and 
shut  over  their  golden  disks,  as  the  rhythmic 
waves  of  blissful  consciousness  pulsate  through 
their  glorified  being. 

The  young  fellow  whom  they  call    John 

saw  fit  to  say,  in  his  very  familiar  way, — at 
which  I  do  not  choose  to  take  offense,  but  which 
I  sometimes  think  it  necessary  to  repress, — that 
I  was  corning  it  rather  strong  on  the  butterflies. 

No,  I  replied;  there  is  meaning  in  each  of 
those  images, — the  butterfly  as  well  as  the 
others.  The  stone  is  ancient  error.  The  grass 
is  human  nature  borne  down  and  bleached  of 
all  its  color  by  it.  The  shapes  that  are  found 
beneath  are  the  crafty  beings  that  thrive  in 
darkness,  and  the  weaker  organisms  kept  help- 
less by  it.  He  who  turns  the  stone  over  is  who- 
soever puts  the  staff  of  truth  to  the  old  lying 


I2O   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

incubus,  no  matter  whether  he  do  it  with  a  se- 
rious face  or  a  laughing  one.  The  next  year 
stands  for  the  coming  time.  Then  shall  the 
nature  which  had  lain  blanched  and  broken  rise 
in  its  full  stature  and  native  hues  in  the  sun- 
shine. Then  shall  God's  minstrels  build  their 
nests  in  the  hearts  of  a  new-born  humanity. 
Then  shall  beauty — Divinity  taking  outlines  and 
color — light  upon  the  souls  of  men  as  the  butter- 
fly, image  of  the  beautified  spirit  rising  from  the 
dust,  soars  from  the  shell  that  held  a  poor  grub, 
which  would  never  have  found  wings,  had  not 
the  stone  been  lifted. 

You  never  need  think  you  can  turn  over  any 
eld  falsehood  without  a  terrible  squirming  and 
scattering  of  the  horrid  little  population  that 
dwells  under  it. 

— Every  real  thought  on  every  real  subject 
knocks  the  wind  out  of  somebody  or  other.  As 
soon  as  his  breath  comes  back, he  very  probably 
begins  to  expend  it  in  hard  words.  These  are 
the  best  evidence  a  man  can  have  that  he  has 
said  something  it  was  tin:e  to  say.  Dr.  Johnson 
was  disappointed  in  the  effects  of  one  of  his 
pamphlets.  "I  think  I  have  not  been  attacked 
enough  for  it,"  he  said; — "attack  is  the  reac- 
tion; I  never  think  I  have  hit  hard  unless  it  re- 
bounds." 

— If  a  fellow  attacked  my  opinion  in  print, 
would  I  reply?  Not  I.  Do  you  think  I  don't 
understand  what  my  friend,  the  Professor,  long 
ago  called  the  hydrostatic  paradox  of  contro- 
versy? 

Don't  know  what  that  means? — Well,   I  will 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   121 

tell  you.  You  know,  that,  if  you  had  a  bent  tube, 
one  arm  of  which  was  of  the  size  of  a  pipe-stem, 
and  the  other  big  enough  to  hold  the  ocean, 
water  would  stand  at  the  same  height  in  one  as 
in  the  other.  Controversy  equalizes  fools  and 
wise  men  in  the  same  way,  —  and  the  fools  \ 
know  it 

—  No,but  I  often  read  what  they  say  about 
other  people.  There  are  about  a  dozen  phrases 
that  all  come  tumbling  along  together,  like  the 
tongs,  and  the  shovel,  and  the  poker,  and  the 
brush,  and  the  bellows,  in  one  of  those  domestic 
avalanches  that  everybody  knows.  If  you  get 
one,  you  get  the  whole  lot. 

What  are  they  ?  —  Oh,  that  depends  a  good  deal 
on  latitude  and  longitude.  Epithets  follow  the 
isothermal  lines  pretty  accurately.  Grouping 
them  in  two  families,  one  finds  himself  a  clever, 
genial,  witty,  wise,  brilliant,  sparkling,  thought- 
ful, distinguished,  celebrated,  illustrious  scholar 
and  perfect  gentleman,  and  first  writer  of  the 
age;  or  a  dull,  foolish,  wicked,  pert,  shallow, 
ignorant,  insolent,  traitorous,  black-hearted  out- 
cast, and  disgrace  to  civilization. 

What  do  I  think  determines  the  set  of  phrases 
a  man  gets?  —  Well,  I  should  say  a  set  of  influ- 
ences something  like  these:  —  ist. 


»hips;  political,  religions.  •ion'al,  dtrmtg**"  ?d 
Tfysters;  in  the  form  of  suppers  given  to  gentle- 
men connected  with  criticism.  I  believe  in  the 
school,  the  college,  and  the  clergy;  but  my  sov- 
ereign logic  for  regulating  public  opinion  —  which 
means  commonly  the  opinion  of  half  a  dozen  of 
the  critical  gentry  —  is  the  following:  Major 


122   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

proposition.  Oysters  au  naturel.  Minor  propo- 
sition. The  same  "scalloped."  Conclusion.  That 

(here  insert  entertainer's  name;  is  clever, 

witty,  wise,  brilliant, — and  the  rest. 

No,  it  isn't  exactly  bribery.  One  man 

has  oysters  and  another  epithets.  It  is  an  ex- 
change of  hospitalities;  one  gives  a  "spread"  on 
linen,  and  the  other  on  paper, — that  is  all. 
Don't  you  think  you  and  I  should  be  apt  to  do 
just  so,  if  we  were  in  the  critical  line?  I  am 
sure  I  couldn't  resist  the  softening  influences 
of  hospitaliy.  I  don't  like  to  dine  out,  you 
know, — I  dine  so  well  at  our  own  table  [our 
landlady  looked  radiant],  and  the  company  is  so 
pleasant  [a  rustling  movement  of  satisfaction 
among  the  boarders] ;  but  if  I  did  partake  of  a 
man's  salt,  with  such  additions  as  that  article 
of  food  requires  to  make  it  palatable,  I  could 
never  abuse  him,  and  if  I  had  to  speak  of  him, 
I  suppose  I  should  hang  my  set  of  jingling 
epithets  round  him  like  a  string  of  sleigh-bells. 
Good  feeling  helps  society  to  make  liars  of  most 
of  us, — not  absolute  liars,  but  such  careless 
handlers  of  truth  that  its  sharp  corners  get  ter- 
ribly rounded.  I  love  truth  as  chiefest  among 
the  virtues;  I  trust  it  runs  in  my  blood;  but  I 
would  never  be  a  critic,  because  I  know  I  could 
not  always  tell  it.  I  might  write  a  criticism  of 
a  book  that  happened  to  please  me;  that  is  an- 
other matter. 

— Listen,  Benjamin  Franklin !  This  is  for 
you,  and  such  others  of  tender  age  as  you  may 
tell  it  to. 

When  we  are  as  yet  small  children,  long  be- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    123 

fore  the  time  when  those  two  grown  ladies  offer 
us  the  choice  of  Hercules,  there  comes  up  to  us 
a  youthful  angel,  holding  in  his  right  hand  cubes 
like  dice,  and  in  his  left  spheres  like  marble. 
The  cubes  are  of  stainless  ivory,  and  on  each  is 
written  in  letters  of  gold — TRUTH.  The  spheres 
are  veined  and  streaked  and  spotted  beneath, 
with  a  dark  crimson  flush  above,  where  the  light 
falls  on  them,  and  in  a  certain  aspect  you  can 
make  out  upon  every  one  of  them  the  three  let- 
ters L,  I,  E.  The  child  to  whom  they  are 
offered  very  probably  clutches  at  both.  The 
spheres  are  the  most  convenient  things  in  the 
world;  they  roll  with  the  least  possible  impulse 
just  where  the  child  would  have  them.  The 
cubes  will  not  roll  at  all;  they  have  a  great  tal- 
ent for  standing  still,  and  always  keep  right  side 
up.  But  very  soon  the  young  philosopher  finds 
that  things  which  roll  so  easily  are  very  apt  to 
roll  into  the  wrong  corner,  and  to  get  out  of  his 
way  when  he  most  wants  them,  while  he  always 
knows  where  to  find  the  others,  which  stay 
where  they  are  left.  Thus  he  learns — thus  we 
learn — to  drop  the  streaked  and  speckled  globes 
of  falsehood  and  to  hold  fast  the  white  angular 
blocks  of  truth.  But  then  comes  Tirnjdity,and 
after  her  Good-njititfe,  and  last  of  all  Politejie^ 
havior,  all  insisting  that  truth  must  roll  or  no- 
"""body  can  do  anything  with  it;  and  so  the  first 
with  her  coarse  rasp,  and  the  second  with  her 
broad  file,  and  the  third  with  her  silken  sleeve, 
do  so  round  off  and  smooth  and  polish  the  snow- 
white  cubes  of  truth,  that,  when  they  have  got 
a  little  dingy  by  use,  it  becomes  hard  to  tell 
them  from  the  rolling  spheres  of  falsehood. 


124   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

The  schoolmistress  was  polite  enough  to  say 
that  she  was  pleased  with  this,  and  that  she 
would  read  it  to  her  little  flock  the  next  day. 
But  she  should  tell  the  children,  she  said,  that 
there  were  better  reasons  for  truth  than  could 
be  found  in  mere  experience  of  its  convenience 
and  inconvenience  of  lying. 

Yes, — I  said, — but  education  always  begins 
through  the  senses,  and  works  up  to  the  idea 
of  absolute  right  and  wrong.  The  first  thing 
the  child  has  to  learn  about  this  matter  is,  that 
lying  is  unprofitable, — afterwards,  that  it  is 
against  the  peace  and  dignity  of  the  universe. 
— Do  I  think  that  the  particular  form  of 
lying  often  seen  in  newspapers,  under  the  title, 
"From  our  Foreign  Correspondent,"  does  any 
harm? — Why,  no, — I  don't  know  that  it  does. 
I  sujrpcse  it  doesn't  really  deceive  people  any 
more  than  the  "Arabian  Nights"  or  "Gulliver's 
Travels"  do.  Sometimes  the  writers  compile  too 
carelessly,  though,  and  mix  up  facts  out  of  geog- 
raphies, and  stories  out  cf  the  penny  papers, 
so  as  to  mislead  those  who  are  desirous  of  in- 
formation. I  cut  a  piece  out  of  one  of  the 
papers,  the  other  day,  that  contains  a  number 
of  in  probabilities,  and,  I  suspect,  misstate- 
ments.  I  will  send  up  and  get  it  for  you,  if 

you  would  like  to  hear  it. Ah,  this  is  it;  it  is 

headed. 

OUR  SUMATRA  CORRESPONDENCE. 

"This  island  is  now  the  property  of  the  Stam- 
ford fcinily, —  having  been  won,  it  is  said,  in  a 
raffle,  by  hir  —  -  Stamford,  during  the  stock- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   125 

gambling  mania  of  the  South-Sea  Scheme.  The 
history  of  this  gentleman  may  be  found  in  an  in- 
teresting series  of  questions  (unfortunately  not 
yet  answered)  contained  in  the  'Notes  and 
Queries.'  This  island  is  entirely  surrounded  by 
the  ocean,  which  here  contains  a  large  amount 
of  saline  substance,  crystallizing  in  cubes  re- 
markable for  their  symmetry,  and  frequently 
displays  on  its  surface,  during  calm  weather, 
the  rainbow  tints  of  the  celebrated  South-Sea 
bubbles.  The  summers  are  oppressively  hot, 
and  the  winters  very  probably  cold;  but  this 
cannot  be  ascertained  precisely,  as,  for  some 
peculiar  reason,  the  mercury  in  these  latitudes 
never  shrinks,  as  in  more  northern  regions,  and 
thus  the  thermometer  is  rendered  useless  in 
winter. 

"The  principle  vegetable  productions  of  the 
island  are  the  pepper  tree  and  the  bread-fruit 
tree.  Pepper  being  very  abundantly  produced, 
a  benevolent  society  was  organized  in  London 
during  the  last  century  for  supplying  the  natives 
with  vinegar  and  oysters,  as  an  addition  to  that 
delightful  condiment.  [Note  received  from  Dr. 
DP.]  It  is  said,  however,  that,  as  the  oysters 
were  of  the  kind  called  natives  in  England,  the 
natives  of  Sumatra,  in  obedience  to  a  natural 
instinct,  refused  to  touch  them,  and  confined 
themselves  entirely  to  the  crew  of  the  vessel  in 
which  they  were  brought  over.  This  informa- 
tion was  received  from  one  of  the  oldest  inhab- 
itants, a  native  himself,  and  exceedingly  fond  of 
missionaries.  He  is  said  also  to  be  very  skillful 
in  the  cuisine  peculiar  to  the  island. 


126   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

"During  the  season  of  gathering  the  pepper, 
the  persons  employed  are  subject  to  various  in- 
commodities,  the  chief  of  which  is  violent  and 
long-continued  sternutation, or  sneezing.  Such 
is  the  vehemence  of  these  attacks,  that  the  un- 
fortunate subjects  of  them  are  often  driven 
backwards  for  great  distances  at  immense  speed, 
on  the  well-known  principle  of  the  aeolipile. 
Not  being  able  to  see  where  they  are  going, 
these  poor  creatures  dash  themselves  to  pieces 
against  the  recks  or  are  precipitated  over  the 
cliffs,  and  thus  many  valuable  lives  are  lost  an- 
nually. As,  during  the  whole  pepper-harvest, 
they  feed  exclusively  on  this  stimulant, they  be- 
come exceedingly  irritable.  The  smallest  injury 
is  resented  with  ungovernable  rage.  A  young 
man  suffering  from  the  pepper-fever,  as  it  is 
called,  cudgeled  another  most  severely  for  ap- 
propriating a  superannuated  relative  of  trifling 
value, and  was  only  pacified  by  having  a  present 
made  him  of  a  pig  of  that  peculiar  species  of 
-  swine  called  the  Peccavi  by  the  Catholic  Jews, 
who, it  is  well  known,  abstain  from  swine's  flesh 
in  imitation  of  the  Mahometan  Buddhists. 

"The  bread-tree  grows  abundantly.  Its 
branches  are  well  known  to  Europe  and  Amer- 
ica under  the  familiar  name  of  maccaroni.  The 
smaller  twigs  are  called  vermicelli.  They  have 
a  decided  animal  flavor,  as  may  be  observed  in 
the  soups  containing  them.  Maccaroni,  being 
tubular,  is  the  favorite  habitat  of  a  very  dan- 
gerous insect,  which  is  rendered  peculiarly  fero- 
cious by  being  boiled.  The  government  of  the 
island,  therefore,  never  allows  a  stick  of  it  to  be 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   127 

exported  without  being  accompanied  by  a  piston 
with  which  its  cavity  may  at  any  time  be  thor- 
oughly swept  out.  These  are  commonly  lost  or 
stolen  before  the  maccaroni  arrives  among  us. 
It  therefore  always  contains  many  of  these  in- 
sects, which,  however,  generally  die  of  old  age 
in  the  shops,  so  that  accidents  from  this  source 
are  comparatively  rare. 

"The  fruit  of  the  bread-tree  consists  principally 
of  hot  rolls.  The  buttered-muffin  variety  is  sup- 
posed to  be  a  hybrid  with  the  cocoa-nut  palm, 
the  cream  found  on  the  milk  of  the  cocoa-nut 
exuding  from  the  hybrid  in  the  shape  of  butter, 
just  as  the  ripa  fruit  is  splitting,  so  as  to  fit  it 
for  the  tea-table,  where  it  is  commonly  served 
up  with  cold" 

—There, — I  don't  want  to  read  any  more 
of  it.  You  see  that  many  of  these  statements 
are  highly  improbable. — No,  I  shall  not  men- 
tion the  paper. — No,  neither  of  them  wrote  it, 
though  it  reminds  me  of  the  style  of  these  pop- 
ular writers.  I  think  the  fellow  that  wrote  it 
must  have  been  reading  some  of  their  stories, 
and  got  them  mixed  up  with  his  history  and  geog- 
raphy. I  don't  suppose  he  lies; — he  sells  it  to 
the  editor,  who  knows  how  many  squares  off 
"Sumatra"  is.  The  editor,  who  sells  it  to  the 

public By  the  way,  the    papers    have    been 

very  civil — haven't  they?— to  the— the — what 
d'ye  call  it? — "Northern  Magazine," — isn't  it? 
— got  up  by  some  of  these  Come-outers,  down 
East,  as  an  organ  for  their  local  peculiarities. 

—The  Professor  as  been  to  see  me.  Came 
in,  glorious,  at  about  twelve  o'clock,  last  night. 


128   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Said  he  had  been  with  "the  boys."  On  inquiry, 
found  that  '"the  boys"  were  certain  baldish  and 
grayish  old  gentlemen  that  one  sees  or  hears  of 
in  various  important  stations  of  society.  The 
Professor  is  one  of  the  same  set,  but  he  always 
talks  as  if  he  had  been  out  of  college  about  ten 

years,  whereas [Each  of  these 

dots  was  a  little  nod,  which  the  company  under- 
stood, as  the  reader  will,  no  doubt.]  He  calls 
them  sometimes  "the  boys, "and  sometimes  "the 
old  fellows."  Call  him  by  the  latter  title,  and 
see  how  he  likes  it. — Well,  he  came  in  last 
night,  glorious,  as  I  was  saying.  Of  course  I 
don't  mean  vinously  exalted;  he  drinks  little 
wine  on  such  occasions,  and  is  well  known  to 
all  the  Johns  and  Patricks  as  the  gentleman  that 
always  has  indefinite  quantities  of  black  tea  to 
kill  any  extra  glass  of  red  claret  he  may  have 
swallowed.  But  the  Professor  says  he  always 
gets  tipsy  on  old  memories  at  these  gatherings. 
He  was,  I  forget  how  many  years  old  when  he 
went  to  the  meeting;  just  turned  of  twenty 
now, — he  said.  He  made  various  youthful  pro- 
posals to  me,  including  a  duet  under  the  land- 
lady's daughter's  window.  He  had  just  learned 
a  trick,  he  said,  of  one  of  "the  boys,"  of  getting 
a  splendid  bass  out  of  a  door-panel  by  rubbing 
it  with  the  palm  of  his  hand,  —  offered  to  sing 
"The  sky  is  bright,"  accompanying  himself  on 
the  front-door,  if  I  would  go  down  and  help  in 
the  chorus.  Said  there  never  was  such  a  set 
of  fellows  as  the  old  boys  of  the  set  he  has 
been  with.  Judges,  mayors,  Congressmen,  Mr. 
Speakers,  leaders  in  science,  clergymen  better 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    I2Q 

than  famous,  and  famous  too,  poets  by  the  half- 
dozen,  singers  with  voices  like  angels,  financiers, 
wits, three  of  the  best  laughers  in  the  Common- 
wealth, engineers,  agriculturists, — all  forms  of 
talent  and  knowledge  he  pretended  were  repre- 
sented in  that  meeting.  Then  he  began  to  quote 
Byron  about  Santa  Croce,and  maintained  that  he 
could  "furnish  out  creation"  in  all  its  details  from 
that  set  of  his.  He  would  like  to  have  the  whole 
boodle  of  them  (I  remonstrated  against  this 
word,  but  the  Professor  said  it  was  a  diabolish 
good  word,  and  he  would  have  no  other),  with 
their  wives  and  children,  shipwrecked  on  a  re- 
mote island,  just  to  see  how  splendidly  they 
would  reorganize  society.  They  could  build  a 
city, — they  have  done  it;  make  constitutions  and 
laws;  establish  churches  andlyceums;  teach  and 
practice  the  healing  art;  instruct  in  every  de- 
partment; found  observatories;  create  commerce 
and  manufactures;  write  songs  and  hymns,  and 
sing  'em,  and  make  instruments  to  accompany 
the  songs  with;  lastly,  publish  a  journal  almost 
as  good  as  the  "Northern  Magazine,"  edited  by 
the  Come-outers.  There  was  nothing  they  were 
not  up  to,  from  a  christening  to  a  hanging;  the 
last,  to  be  sure,  could  never  be  called  for,  un- 
less some  stranger  got  in  among  them. 

— I  let  the  Professor  talk  as  long  as  he  liked; 
it  didn't  make  much  difference  to  me  whether  it 
was  a  truth,  or  partly  made  up  of  pale  Sherry 
and  similar  elements.  All  at  once  he  jumped 
up  and  said, — 

Don't  you  want  to  hear  what  I    just    read  to 
the  boys? 


I3O   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

I  have  had  questions  of  a  similar  character 
asked  me  before,  occasionally.  A  man  of  iron 
mold  might  perhaps  say,  No!  I  am  not  a  man 
of  iron  mold,  and  said  that  I  should  be  delighted. 

The  Professor  then  read — with  that  slightly 
sing-song  cadence  which  is  observed  to  be  com- 
mon in  poets  reading  their  own  verses — the  fol- 
lowing stanzas;  holding  them  at  a  focal  distance 
of  about  two  feet  and  a  half,  with  an  occasional 
movement  back  orfoward  for  better  adjustment, 
the  appearance  of  which  has  been  likened  by 
some  impertinent  young  folks  to  that  of  the  act 
of  playing  on  the  trombone.  His  eyesight  was 
never  better;  I  have  his  word  for  it. 

MARE  RUBRUM. 
FLASH  out  a  stream  of  blood-red  wine!— 

For  I  would  drink  to  other  days; 
And  brighter  shall  their  memory  shine, 

Seen  flaming  through  its  crimson  blaze. 
The  roses  die,  the  summers  fade; 

But  every  ghost  of  boyhood's  dream 
By  Nature's  magic  power  is  laid 

To  sleep  beneath  this  blood-red  stream. 

It  filled  the  purple  grapes  that  lay 

And  drank  the  splendors  of  the  sun 
Where  the  long  summer's  cloudless  day 

Is  mirrored  io  the  broad  Garonne; 
It  pictures  still  the  bacchant  shapes 

That  saw  their  hoarded  sunlight  shed,— 
The  maidens  dancing  on  the  grapes, — 

Their  milk-white  ankles  splashed  with  red. 

Beneath  these  waves  of  crimson  lie, 

In  rosy  fetters  prisoned  fast, 
Those  flitting  shapes  that  never  die, 

The  swift-winged  visions  of  the  past. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   13* 

Kiss  but  the  crystal's  mystic  rim, 
Each  shadow  rends  its  flowery  chain, 

Springs  in  a  bubble  from  its  brim, 
And  walks  the  chambers  of  the  brain. 

Poor  Beauty!  time  and  fortune's  wrong 

No  form  nor  feature  may  withstand, — 
Thy  wrecks  are  scattered  all  along, 

Like  emptied  sea-shells  on  the  sand; — 
Yet,  sprinkled  with  this  blushing  rain, 

The  dust  restores  each  blooming  girl, 
As  if  the  sea-shells  moved  again 

Their  glistening  lips  of  pink  and  pearl. 

Here  lies  the  home  of  school-boy  life, 

With  creaking  stair  and  wind-swept  hall, 
And,  scarred  by  many  a  truant  knife. 

Our  old  initials  on  the  wall; 
Here  rest — their  keen  vibrations  mute — 

The  shout  of  voices  known  so  well, 
The  ringing  laugh,  the  wailing  flute, 

The  chiding  of  the  sharp-tongued  bell. 

Here,  clad  in  burning  robes,  are  laid 

Life's  blossomed  joys,  untimely  shed; 
And  here  those  cherished  forms  have  strayed 

We  miss  awhile,  and  call  them  dead. 
What  wizard  fills  the  maddening  glass? 

What  soil  the  enchanted  clusters  grew, 
That  buried  passions  wake  and  pass 

In  beaded  drops  of  fiery  dew? 

Nay,  take  the  cup  of  blood-red  wine, — 

Our  hearts  can  boast  a  warmer  glow, 
Filled  from  a  vintage  more  divine, — 

Calmed,  but  not  chilled  by  winter's  snow! 
To-night  the  palest  wave  we  sip 

Rich  as  the  priceless  draught  shall  be 
That  wet  the  bride  of  Cana's  lip,— 

The  wedding  wine  of  Galilee! 


132  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 


VI. 


Sin  has  many  tools,  b»ut  a  lie  is  the  handle 
which  fits  them  all. 

— I  think,  Sir, — said  the  divinity-student, 
— you  must  intend  that  for  one  of  the  sayings 
of  the  Seven  Wise  Men  of  Boston  you  were 
speaking  of  the  other  day. 

I  thank  you, my  young  friend, — was  my  reply, 
—  but  I  must  say  something  better  than  that, 
before  I  could  pretend  to  fill  out  the  number. 

The  schoolmistress  wanted  to  know  how 

many  of  these  sayings  there  were  on  record, and 
what,  and  by  whom  said. 

Why,  let  us  see, — there   is    that   one    of 

Benjamin  Franklin, "the  great  Bostonian,"  after 
whom  this  lad  was  named.  To  be  sure,  he  said 
a  great  many  wise  things, — and  I  don't  feel  sure 
he  didn't  borrow  this, — he  speaks  as  if  it  were  old. 
But  then  he  applied  it  so  neatly! — 

"He  that  has  once  done  you  a  kindness  will 
be  more  ready  to  do  you  another  than  he  whom 
you  yourself  have  obliged." 

Then  there  is  that  glorious  Epicurean  paradox, 
uttered  by  my  friend,  the  Historian,  in  one  of 
his  flashing  moments:  — 

"Give  us  the  luxuries  of  life,  and  we  will  dis- 
pense with  its  necessaries  " 

To  these  must  certainly  be  added  that  other 
saying  of  one  of  the  wittiest  of  men:  — 

"Good  Americans,  when  they  die, go  to  Paris." 

The  divinity-student  looked  grave  at  this, 

but  said  nothing. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   133 

The  schoolmistress  spoke  out,  and  said  she 
didn't  think  the  wit  meant  any  irreverence.  It 
was  only  another  way  of  saying,  Paris  is  a  heav- 
enly place  after  New  York  or  Boston. 

A  jaunty-looking  person,  who  had  come  in 
with  the  young  fellow  they  call  John, — evidently 
a  stranger,  —  said  there  was  one  more  wise  man's 
sayings  that  he  had  heard;  it  was  about  our 
place,  but  he  didn't  know  who  said  it.  A  civil 
curiosity  was  manifested  by  the  company  to  hear 
the  fourth  wise  saying.  I  heard  him  distinctly 
whispering  to  the  young  fellow  who  brought 
him  to  dinner,  Shall  1  tell  it?  To  which  the  an- 
swer was,  Go  ahead! — Well, — he  said, —  this 
was  what  I  heard: — 

"Boston  State-House  is  the  hub  of  the    solar 
system.      You  couldn't  pry  that  out  of  a  Boston 
man,  if  you  had  the  tire  of  all  creation  straight 
ened  out  for  a  crowbar." 

Sir, — said  I, — I  am  gratified  with  your  remark. 
It  expresses  with  pleasing  vivacity  that  which 
I  have  sometimes  heard  uttered  with  malignant 
dullness.  The  satire  of  the  remark  is  essentially 
true  of  Boston, — and  of  all  other  considerable 
— and  inconsiderable —places  with  which  I  have 
had  the  privilege  of  being  acquainted.  Cock- 
neys think  London  is  the  only  place  in  the  world. 
Frenchmen — you  remember  the  line  about  Paris, 
the  Court,  the  World,  etc.— I  recollect  well,  by 
the  way,  a  sign  in  that  city  which  ran  thus: 
"Hotel  de  1'Univers  et  des  Etats  Unis;"  and  as 
Paris  is  the  universe  to  a  Frenchman,  of  course 
the  United  States  are  outside  of  it. — "See  Naples 
and  then  die." — It  is  quite  as  bad  with  smaller 


134   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

places.  I  have  been  about,  lecturing,  you  know, 
and  have  found  the  following  propositions  to 
hold  true  of  all  of  them. 

1.  The  axis   of   the    earth    sticks  cut    visibly 
through  the  center  of  each  and  every    town    or 
city. 

2.  If  more  than  fifty  years  have  passed    since 
its  foundation,  it  is  affectionately  styled  by   the 
inhabitants  the  ''''good  old  town    of" (what- 
ever its  name  happens  to  be). 

3.  Every    collection    of    its    inhabitants  that 
comes  together  to  listen  to  a  stranger  is    invar- 
iably declared  to  be   a    "remarkably    intelligent 
audience." 

4.  The  climate  of    the    place    is    particularly 
favorable  to  longevity. 

5.  It  contains  several  persons  of   vast    talent 
little  known  to  the  world.    (One  or  two  of  them, 
you  may  perhaps  chance  to  remember,sent  short 
pieces  to  the  "Pactolian"  some  time  since,  which 
were  "respectfully  declined.") 

Boston  is  just  like  the  other  places  of  its  size; 
— only,  perhaps,  considering  its  excellent  fish- 
market,  paid  fire-department,  superior  monthly 
publications,  and  correct  habit  of  spelling  the 
English  language.it  has  some  right  to  look  down 
on  the  mob  of  cities.  I'll  tell  you,  though,  if 
you  want  to  know  it,  what  is  the  real  offense  of 
Boston.  It  drains  a  larger  watershed  of  its  in- 
tellect, and  will  not  itself  be  drained.  If  it 
would  only  send  away  its  first-rate  men,  instead 
of  its  second-rate  ones  (no  offense  to  well-known 
exceptions,  of  which  we  are  always  proud),  we 
should  be  spared  such  epigrammatic  remarks  as 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    135 

that  which  the  gentleman  has  quoted.  There 
can  never  be  a  real  metropolis  in  this  country, 
until  the  biggest  center  drain  the  lesser  ones  of 
their  talent  and  wealth  — I  have  observed,  by 
the  way,  that  the  people  who  really  live  in  two 
great  cities  are  by  no  means  so  jealous  of  each 
other,  as  are  those  of  smaller  cities  situated 
within  the  intellectual  basin,  or  suction-range, 
of  one  large  one,  of  the  pretensions  of  any 
other.  Don't  you  see  why?  Because  their  prom- 
ising young  author  and  rising  lawyer  and  large 
capitalist  have  been  drained  off  to  the  neighboring 
big  city, — their  prettiest  girl  has  been  exported 
to  the  same  market;  all  their  ambition  points 
there,  and  all  their  thin  gilding  of  glory  comes 
from"  there.  I  hate  little  toad-eating  cities. 

— Would  I  be  so  good  as  to  specify  any  par- 
ticular example? — Oh, — an  example?  Did  you 
ever  see  a  bear-trap?  Never?  Well,  shouldn't 
you  like  to  see  me  put  my  foot  into  one?  With 
sentiments  of  the  highest  consideration  I  must 
beg  leave  to  be  excused. 

Besides,  some  of  the  smaller  cities  are  charm- 
ing If  they  have  an  old  church  or  two,  a  few 
stately  mansions  of  former  grandees,  here  and 
there  an  old  dwelling  with  the  second  story  pro- 
jecting, (for  the  convenience  of  shooting  the  In- 
dians knocking  at  the  front-door  with  their  tom- 
ahawks),—if  they  have,  scattered  about,  those 
mighty  square  houses  built  something  more  than 
half  a  century  ago,  and  standing  like  architec- 
tural boulders  dropped  by  the  former  diluvium 
of  wealth,  whose  refluent  wave  has  left  them  as 
its  monument, — if  they  have  gardens  with  el- 


136  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

bowed  apple-trees  that  push  their  branches  over 
the  big  board-fence  and  drop  their  fruit  on  the 
side-walk,  —  if  they  have  a  little  grass  in  the  side- 
streets,  enough  to  betoken  quiet  without  pro- 
claiming decay, —  I  think  I  could  go  to  pieces, 
after  my  life's  work  were  done,  in  one  of  these 
tranquil  places,  as  sweetly  as  in  any  cradle  that 
an  old  man  may  be  rocked  to  sleep  in.  I  visit 
such  spots  always  with  infinite  delight.  My 
friend,  the  Poet,  says,  that  rapidly  growing  towns 
are  most  unfavorable  to  the  imaginative  and  re- 
flective faculties.  Let  a  man  live  in  one  of  these 
old,  quiet  places,  he  says,  and  the  wine  of  his 
soul,  which  is  kept  thick  and  turbid  by  the  rat- 
tle of  busy  streets,  settles,  and,  as  you  hold  it 
up,  you  may  see  the  sun  through  it  by  day  and 
the  stars  by  night. 

— Do  I  think  that  the  little  villages  have  the 
conceit  of  the  great  towns? — I  don't  believe 
there  is  much  difference.  You  know  how  they 
read  Pope's  line  in  the  smallest  town  in  our  State 
of  Massachusetts? — Well,  they  read  it 

"All  are  but  parts  of  one  stupendous  HULL!" 

Every  person's  feelings  have  a  front-door 

and  a  side-door  by  which  they  may  be  entered. 
The  front-door  is  on  the  street.  Some  keep 
it  always  open;  some  keep  it  latched;  some, 
locked;  some,  bolted, — with  a  chain  that 
will  let  you  peep  in,  but  not  get  in;  and  some 
nail  \t.  up,  so  that  nothing  can  pass  its  thresh- 
old. /This  front-door  leads  into  a  passage 
which  opens  into  an  ante-room,  and  this  into 
the  interior  apartments.  The  side-door  opens 
at  once  into  the  sacred  chambers. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE     137 

There  is  almost  always  at  least  one  key  to 
this  side-door.  This  is  carried  for  years  hidden  in 
a  mother's  bosom  Fathers,  brothers, sisters, and 
friends,  often,  but  by  no  means  so  universally, 
have  duplicates  of  it.  The  wedding-ring  con- 
veys a  right  to  onejalas,  if  none  is  given  with 
it! 

If  nature  or  accident  has  put  one  of  these  keys 
into  the  hands  of  a  person  who  has  the  tortur- 
ing instinct,  I  can  only  solemnly  pronounce  the 
words  that  Justice  utters  over  its  doomed  victim, 
—  The  Lord  have  mercy  on  your  soul!  You  will 
probably  go  mad  within  a  reasonable  time, — or, 
if  you  are  a  man,  run  off  and  die  with  your  head 
on  a  curb-stone,  in  Melbourne  or  San  Francisco, 
— or,  if  you  are  a  woman,  quarrel  and  break  your 
heart,  or  turn  into  a  pale,  jointed  petrifaction 
that  moves  about  as  if  it  were  alive,  or  play 
some  real  life-tragedy  or  other. 

Be  very  careful  to  whom  you  trust  one  of  these 
keys  of  the  side-door.  The  fact  of  possessing 
one  renders  those  even  who  are  dear  to  you 
very  terrible  at  times.  You  can  keep  the  world 
out  from  your  front-door,  or  receive  visitors  only 
when  you  are  ready  for  them;  but  those  of  your 
own  flesh  and  blood,  or  of  certain  grades  of  in- 
timacy, can  come  in  at  the  side-door,  if  they 
will,  at  any  hour  and  in  any  mood.  Some  of 
them  have  a  scale  of  your  whole  nervous  system, 
and  can  play  all  the  gamut  of  your  sensibilities 
in  semitones, — touching  the  naked  nerve  pulps 
as  a  pianist  strikes  the  keys  of  his  instrument. 
I  am  satisfied  that  there  are  as  great  masters  of 
this  nerve-playing  as  Vieuxtemps  or  Thalberg 


138  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

in  their  lines  of  performance.  Married  life  is  the 
school  in  which  the  most  accomplished  artists  in 
this  department  are  found.  A  delicate  woman 
is  the  best  instrument;  she  has  such  a  magnifi- 
cent compass  of  sensibilities!  From  the  deep 
inward  moan  which  follows  pressure  on  the  great 
nerves  of  right,  to  the  sharp  cry  as  the  filaments 
of  taste  are  struck  with  a  crashing  sweep,  is  a 
range  which  no  other  instrument  possesses.  A 
few  exercises  on  it  daily  at  home  fit  a  man  won- 
derfully for  his  habitual  labors,  and  refresh 
him  immensely  as  he  returns  from  them.  No 
stranger  can  get  a  great  many  notes  of  torture 
out  of  human  soul;  it  takes  one  that  knows  it 
well,-  parent,  child,  brother,  sister,  intimate. 
Bcjirrjr  rnrcfnl  to  >nnnm  ynn  givf  n  si^ 


key;  too  many  have  them  already. 

-  YulTremember  the  old  story  of  the  tender- 
hearted man,  who  placed  a  frozen  viper  in  his 
bosom,  and  was  stung  by  it  when  it  became 
thawed?  If  we  take  a  cold-blooded  creature 
into  our  bosom,  better  that  it  should  sting  us 
and  we  should  die  than  that  its  chill  should 
slowly  steal  into  our  hearts;  warm  it  we  never 
can!  I  have  seen  faces  of  women  that  were  fair 
to  look  upon,  yet  one  could  see  that  the  icicles 
were  forming  round  these  women's  hearts.  I 
knew  what  freezing  image  lay  on  the  white 
breasts  beneath  the  laces! 

A  very  simple  intellectual  mechanism  answers 
the  necessities  of  friendship,  and  even  of  the 
most  intimate  relations  of  life.  If  a  watch  tells 
us  the  hour  and  the  minute,  we  can  be  content 
to  carry  it  about  with  us  for  a  life-time,  though 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    139 

it  has  no  second-hand  and  is  not  a  repeater,  noi 
a  musical  watch, — thjugh  it  is  not  enameled 
nor  jeweled, — in  short,  though  it  has  little  be- 
yond the  wheels  required  for  a  trustworthy  in- 
strument, added  to  a  good  face  and  a  pair  of 
useful  hands.  The  more  wheels  there  are  in  a 
watch  or  a  brain,  the  more  trouble  they  are  to 
take  care  of.  The  movements  of  exaltation 
which  belong  to  genius  are  egotistic  by  their  very 
nature.  A  calm,  clear  mind,  not  subject  to  the 
spasms  and  crises  that  are  so  often  met  with  in 
creative  or  intensely  perceptive  natures,  is  the 
best  basis  for  love  or  friendship.  —  Observe,  I 
am  talking  about  minds.  I  won't  say,  the  more 
intellect,  the  less  capacity  for  loving;  for  that 
would  do  wrong  to  the  understanding  and  rea- 
son;— but,  on  the  other  hand,  that  the  brain 
often  runs  away  with  the  heart's  best  blood, 
which  gives  the  world  a  few  pages  of  wisdom  or 
sentiment  or  poetry,  instead  of  making  one  other' 
heart  happy,  I  have  no  question. 

If  one's  intimate  in  love  or  friendship  cannot 
or  does  not  share  all  one's  intellectual  tastes  or 
pursuits,  that  is  a  small  matter.  Intellectual 
companions  can  be  found  easily  in  men  and 
books.  After  all,  if  we  think  of  it,  most  of  the 
world's  loves  and  friendships  have  been  between 
people  that  could  not  read  nor  spell. 

But  to  radiate  the  heat  of  the  affections  into 
a  clod,  which  absorbs  all  that  is  poured  into  it, 
but  never  warms  beneath  the  sunshine  of  smiles 
or  the  pressure  of  hand  or  lip, — this  is  the  great 
martyrdom  of  sensitive  beings, — most  of  all  in 
that  perpetual  auto  da  fe  where  young  woman- 
hood is  the  sacrifice. 


140      THE   AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

You  noticed,   perhaps,    what    I  just  said 

about  the  loves  and  friendships  of  illiterate  per- 
sons,— that  is, of  the  human  race,  with  a  few  ex- 
ceptions here  and  there.  I  like  books, — I  was 
born  and  bred  among  them,  and  have  the  easy 
feeling  when  I  get  into  their  presence,  that  a 
stable-boy  has  among  horses.  I  don't  think  I 
undervalue  them  either  as  companions  or  as  in- 
structors. But  I  can't  help  remembering  that 
the  world's  great  men  have  not  commonly  been 
great  scholars,  nor  its  great  scholars  great  men. 
The  Hebrew  patriarchs  had  small  libraries,  I 
think, if  any;  yet  they  represent  to  our  imagina- 
tions a  very  complete  idea  of  manhood,  and,  I 
think,  if  we  could  ask  in  Abraham  to  dine  with 
us  men  of  letters  next  Saturday,  we  should  feel 
honored  by  his  company. 

What  I  wanted  to  say  about  books  is  this: 
that  there  are  times  in  which  every  active  mind 
feels  itself  above  any  and  all  human  books. 

1  think  a  man  nr.ist  have  a  good  opinion 

of  himself,  Sir,  — said  the  divinity-student, — 
who  should  feel  himself  above  Shakespeare  at 
any  time. 

tt      My  young  friend, — I  replied, — the  man  who  is 

f  never  conscious  of  any  state  of  feeling  or  of  in- 

'  tellectuil    effort    entirely  beyond   expression  by 

if1  any  form  of  words  whatsoever    is  a    mere  crea- 

llf  ture   of  language.     I    can    hardly  believe  there 

are  any    such  men.     Wny,  think  for  a  moment 

of    the     power    of    misic.      The     nerves    that 

make  us  alive  to  it  spread  out  (so  the  Professor 

tells    ms)    in    the  most    sensitive  region  of    the 

marrow, just  where  it  is  widening  to  run  upwards 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   14! 

into  the  hemispheres.  It  has  its  seat  in  the 
region  of  sense  rather  than  of  thought.  Yet 
it  produces  a  continuous  and,  as  it  were, 
logical  sequence  of  emotional  and  intellectual 
changes  ;  but  how  different  from  trains  of  thought 
proper!  how  entirely  beyond  the  reach  of  sym- 
bols!— Think  of  human  passions  as  compared 
with  all  phrases!  Did  you  ever  hear  of  a  man's 
growing  lean  by  the  reading  of  "Romeo  and 
Juliet,"  or  blowing  his  brains  out  because  Des- 
demona  was  maligned?  There  are  a  good  many 
symbols,  even,  that  are  more  expressive  than 
words.  I  remember  a  young  wife  who  had  to 
part  with  her  husband  for  a  time.  She  did  not 
write  a  mournful  poem;  indeed,  she  was  a  silent 
person,  and  perhaps  hardly  said  a  word  about 
it;  but  she  quietly  turned  of  a  deep  orange  color 
with  jaundice.  A  great  many  people  in  this 
world  have  but  one  form  of  rhetoric  for  their 
prcfoundest  experiences, — namely,  to  waste 
away  and  die.  When  a  man  can  read,  his  par- 
oxysm of  feeling  is  passing.  When  he  can  read, 
his  thought  has  slackened  its  held. — You  talk 
about  readirg  Shakespeare,  using  him  as  an  ex- 
pression for  the  highest  intellect,  and  you  won- 
der that  any  common  person  should  be  so  pre- 
sumptuous as  to  suppose  his  thought  can  rise 
above  the  text  which  lies  before  him.  But  think 
a  moment.  A  child's  reading  of  Shakespeare  is 
one  thing,  and  Coleridge's  or  Schlegel's  reading 
of  him  is  another.  The  saturation-point  of  each 
mind  differs  from  that  of  every  other.  But  I 
think  it  is  as  true  for  the  small  mind  which  can 
only  take  up  a  little  as  for  the  great  one  which 


142   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

takes  up  much,  that  the  suggested  trains  of 
thought  and  feeling  ought  always  to  rise  above 
— not  the  author,  but  the  reader's  mental  ver- 
sion of  the  author,  whoever  he  may  be. 

I  think  most  readers  of  Shakespeare  sometimes 
find  themsslves  thrown  into  exalted  mental  con- 
ditions like  those  produced  by  music.  Then 
they  may  drop  the  book,  to  pass  at  once  into 
the  region  of  thought  without  words.  We  may 
happen  to  be  very  dull  folks,  you  and  I,  and 
probably  are,  unless  there  is  some  particular 
reason  to  suppose  the  contrary.  But  we  get 
glimpses  now  and  then  of  a  sphere  of  spiritual 
possibilities, where  we,  dull  as  we  are  now,  may 
sail  in  vast  circles  round  the  largest  compass  of 
earthly  intelligences. 

-I  confess  there  are  times  when  I  feel  like 

the  friend  I  mentioned  to  you  some  tims  ago,  —  I 
hate  the  very  sight  of  a  book.  Sometimes  it  be- 
comes almost  a  physical  necessity  to  talk  out 
what  is  in  the  mind,  before  putting  anything 
else  into  it.  It  is  very  bad  to  have  thoughts  and 

;  feelings,  which  were  meant  to  come  out  in  talk, 
strike  in,  as  they  say  of  some  complaints  that 
ought  to  show  outwardly. 

I  always  believed  in  life  rather  than  in  books. 
I  suppose  every  day  of  earth,  with  its  hundred 
thousand  deaths  and  something  more  of  births, 
— with  its  loves  and  hates,  its  triumphs  and  de- 
feats, its  pangs  and  blisses, has  more  of  humanity 
in  it  than  all  the  books  that  were  ever  written, 
put  together.  I  believe  the  flowers  growing  at 
this  moment  send  up  more  fragrance  to  heaven 
than  was  ever  exhaled  from  all  the  essences  ever 
distilled. 


THE  AUTOCRAT    OF    THE   BREAKFAST-TABLE          143 

Don't  I  read  up  various   matters  to    talk 

about  at  this  table  or  elsewhere? — No,that  is  the 
last  thing  I  would  do.  I  will  tell  you  my  rule. 
Talk  about  those  subjects  you  have  had  long  in 
your  mind,  and  listen  to  what  others  say  about 
subjects  you  have  studied  but  recently.  Knowl- 
edge and  timber  shouldn't  be  much  used  ..till 
they  are  seasoned. 

—  Physiologists  and  metaphysicians  have 
had  their  attention  turned  a  good  deal  of  late  to 
the  autcmatic  and  involuntary  actions  of  the 
mind.  Put  an  idea  into  your  intelligence  and 
leave  it  there  an  hour,  a  day,  a  year,  without 
ever  having  occasion  to  refer  to  it.  When,  at 
last,  you  return  to  it, you  do  not  find  it  as  it  was 
\\hen  acquired.  It  has  domiciliated  itself,  so 
to  speak,— become  at  home, — entered  into  re- 
lations with  your  other  thoughts,  and  integrated 
itself  with  the  whole  fabric  of  the  mind. —  Or 
take  a  simple  and  familiar  example.  You  for- 
get a  name,  in  conversation, — go  on  talking, 
without  making  any  effort  to  recall  it, — and  pres- 
ently the  mind  evolves  it  by  its  own  involuntary 
and  unconscious  action,  while  you  were  pursu- 
ing another  train  of  thought,  and  the  name  rises 
of  itself  to  your  lips. 

There  are  some  curious  observations  I  should 
like  to  make  about  the  mental  machinery,  but  I 
think  we  are  getting  rather  didactic. 

— I  should  be  gratified,  if  Benjamin  Frank- 
lin would  let  me  know  something  of  his  prog- 
ress in  the  French  language.  I  rather  liked  that 
exercise  he  read  us  the  other  day, though  I  must- 
confess  I  should  hardly  dare  to  translate  it,  for 


144  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

fear  some  people  in  a  remote  city  where  I  once 
lived  might  think  I  was  drawing  their  portraits. 

Yes,  Paris  is  a  famous  place  for  societies. 

I  don't  know  whether  the  piece  I  mentioned 
from  the  French  author  was  intended  simply  as 
Natural  History,  or  whether  there  was  not  a  little 
malice  in  his  description.  At  any  rate,  when  I 
gave  my  translation  to  B.  F.  to  turn  back  again 
into  French,  one  reason  was  that  I  thought  it 
would  sound  a  little  bald  in  English,  and  some 
people  might  think  it  was  meant  to  have  some 
local  bearing  or  other, — which  the  author,  of 
course,  didn't  mean,  inasmuch  as  he  could  not 
be  acquainted  with  anything  on  this  side  the 
water. 

[The  above  remarks  were  addressed  to  the 
schoolmistress,  to  whom  I  handed  the  paper  after 
looking  it  over.  The  divinity-student  came  and 
read  over  her  shoulder, — very  curious,  appar- 
ently, but  his  eyes  wandered,  I  thought.  See- 
ing that  her  breathing  was  a  little  hurried  and 
high,  or  thoracic,  as  my  friend  the  Professor 
calls  it,  I  watched  her  a  little  more  closely.  — It 
is  none  of  my  business. — After  all,  it  is  the 
imponderables  that  move  the  world, — heat, 
electricity,  love. — Habet.~\ 

This  is  the  piece  that  Benjamin  Franklin 
made  into  boarding-school  French,  such  as  you 
see  here;  don't  expect  too  much; — the  mistakes 
give  a  relish  to  it,  I  think. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST -TABLE   145 


LES  SOCIETES  POLYPHYSIOPHILOSOPHIQUES. 

CES  Societ^s  la  sont  une  Institution  pour  supplier  aux  besoins 
d'esprit  et  de  coeur  de  ces  individus  quiont  survecu  &  leurs  Emo- 
tions a  l'e*gard  du  beau  sexe,  et  qui  n'ont  pas  la  distraction  de 
I'habitude  de  boire. 

Pour  devenir  membre  d'une  de  ces  Socie'te's,  on  doit  avoir  le 
moins  de  cheveux  possible.  S'il  y  en  reste  plusieurs  qui  resistent 
aux  de'pilatoires  naturelles  et  autres,  on  doit  avoir  quelques  con- 
naissances,  n'importe  dans  quel  genre.  Des  le  moment  qu'on 
ouvre  la  porte  de  la  Societe,  on  a  un  grand  interet  dans  toutes 
les  choses  dont  on  ne  sail  rien.  Ainsi,  un  microscopiste  de"montre 
un  nouveau  flexor  du  tarse  d'un  melolonlka  vulgaris.  Douze  sa- 
vans  improvises,  portans  des  besides,  et  qui  ne  connaissent  rien 
des  insectes,  si  ce  n'est  les  morsures  du  culex,  se  pre'cipitent  sur 
f  instrument,  et  vbient,  —  une  grande  bulle  d'air,  dont  ils  s'emer- 
veillent  avec  effusion.  Ce  qui  est  un  spectacle  plein  d'instruc- 
tion,' — pour  ceux  qui  ne  sont  pai  de  ladite  Societe.  Tous  les 
membres  regardent  les  chimistes  en  particulier  avec  un  air  d'in- 
telligence  parfaite  pendant  qu'ils  prouvent  dans  un  discours 
d'une  demiheure  que  O8  N3  H5  C6  etc.  font  quelque  chose  qui 
n'est  bonne  a  rien,  mais  qui  probablement  a  une  odeur  tres 
de'sagre'able,  selon  Thabitude  des  produits  chimiques.  Apres  celfc 
vient  un  mathematicien  qui  vous  bourre  avec  des  a  -}-  b  et  vous 
rapporte  enfin  un  x-\-y,  dont  vous  n'avez  pas  besoin  et  qui  ne 
change  nulleinent  vos  relations  avec  la  vie.  Un  naturaliste  vous 
parle  des  formations  speciales  des  animaux  cxcessivement  incon- 
nus,  dont  vous  n'avez  jamais  soup9onne  1'existence.  Ainsi  il 
vous  decrit  les  follicules  de  Vappendix  vermiformis  d'un  dzig- 
guetai.  Vous  ne  savez  pas  ce  que  c'est  qu'un  follicule.  Vous 
ne  savez  pas  ce  que  c'est  qu'un  appendix  vermiformis.  Vous 
n'avez  jamais  entendu  parler  du  dzigguelai.  Ainsi  vous  gagnez 
toutes  ces  connaissances  a  la  fois.  aui  s'attachent  &  votre  esprit 


146  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

comme  1'eau  adhere  aux  plumes  d'un  canard.  On  connait  toutes 
les  langues  ex  officio  en  devenant  membre  d'une  de  ces  Societes. 
Ainsi  quand  on  entend  lire  un  Essai  sur  les  dialectes  Tcbut- 
chiens,  on  comprend  tout  celil  de  suite,  et  s'instruit  enorme- 
ment. 

II  y  a  deux  especes  d'individus  qu'on  trouve  toujours  a  cea 
Societes  :  1°  Le  membre  a  questions;  2°  Le  membre  a  "  By- 
laws." 

La  question  est  une  specialite.  Celui  qui  en  fait  metier  ne  fait 
jamais  des  reponses.  La  question  est  une  maniere  tres  commode 
de  dire  les  choses  suivantes:  "Me  voila!  Je  ne  suis  pas  fossil, 
moi, — je  respire  encore!  J'ai  des  idees,  —  voyez  mon  intel- 
ligence! Vous  ne  croyiez  pas,  vous  autres,  que  je  savais  quelquo 
chose  de  cela!  Ah,  nous  avons  un  peu  de  sagacite,  voyez  vous! 
Nous  ne  sommes  nullement  la  bete  qu'on  pense!  "  —  Le  faiseur 
de  questions  donne  peu  d 'attention  aux  reponses  qu'on  fait;  ce 
n'est  pas  la  dans  sa  specialite'. 

Le  membre  &  "  Bylaws  "  est  le  bouchoirde  toutes  les  emotions 
mousseuses  et  genereuses  qui  se  montrent  dans  la  Societe.  C'est 
un  empereur  manque,  —  un  tyran  a  la  troisieme  trituration. 
C'est  un  esprit  dur,  borne,  exact,  grand  dans  les  petitesses,  petit 
dans  les  grandeurs,  selon  le  mot  du  grand  Jefferson.  On  ne 
I'aime  pas  dans  la  Societe,  mais  on  le  respecte  et  on  le  craint. 
II  n'y  a  qu'un  mot  pour  ce  membre  audessus  de  "  Bylaws."  Ce 
mot  est  pour  lui  ce  que  POm  est  aux  Hindous.  C'est  sa  religion; 
il  n'y  a  rien  audela.  Ce  mot  1&  c'est  la  CONSTITUTION! 

Lesdites  Societes  publient  des  feuilletons  de  terns  en  terns. 
On  les  trouve  abandonnes  &  sa  porte,  nus  comme  des  enfans 
nouveaunes,  faute  de  membrane  cutanee,  ou  meme  papyracde. 
Si  on  aime  la  botanique,  on  y  trouve  une  raemoire  sur  les 
coquilles  ;  si  on  fait  des  etudes  z»ologiques,  on  trouve  un  grand 
tas  deq'.y —  1,  ce  qui  doit  etre  infiniment  plus  commode  que 
les  encyclope"dies:  Ainsi  il  est  clair  comme  la  metaphysique 
qu'on  doit  devenir  membre  d'une  Socie'te'  telle  que  nous  de*- 
crivons. 

Recetle  pour  le  De'pilatoire  PJiysiophilosophique. 

Chaux  vive  Ib.  ss.     Eau  bouillante  Oj. 

Depilez  avec.     Polisscz  ensuite. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   147 

— I  told  the  boy  that  his  translation  into 
French  was  creditable  to  him;  and  some  of  the 
company  wishing  to  hear  what  there  was  in  the 
piece  that  made  me  smile,  I  turned  it  into  Eng- 
lish for  them,  as  well  as  I  could,  en  the  spot. 

The  landlady's  daughter  seemed  to  be  much 
amused  by  the  idea  that  a  depilatory  could  take 
the  place  of  literary  and  scientific  accomplish- 
ments; she  wanted  me  to  print  thepiece.so  that 
she  might  send  a  copy  of  it  to  her  cousin  in 
Mizzourah;  she  didn't  think  he'd  have  to  do 
anything  to  the  outside  of  his  head  to  get  into 
any  of  the  societies;  he  had  to  wear  a  wig  once, 
when  he  played  a  part  in  a  tabullo. 

No,  —  said  I,  —I  shouldn't  think  of  printing 
that  in  English.  I'll  tell  you  why.  As  soon  as 
you  get  a  few  thousand  people  together  in  a 
town,  there  is  somebody  that  every  sharp  thing 
you  say  is  sure  to  hit.  What  if  a  thing  was 
written  in  Paris  or  in  Pekin? — that  n:akes  no 
difference.  Everybody  in  those  cities, or  almost 
everybody,  as  his  counterpart  here,  and  in  all 
large  places.  — You  never  studied  averages,  as  I 
have  had  occasion  to. 

I'll  tell  you  how  I  came  to  know  so  much 
about  averages.  There  was  cne  season  when 
I  was  lecturing,  commonly,  five  evenings  in 
the  week,  through  mcst  of  the  lecturing  period. 
I  soon  found,  as  most  speakers  do,  that  it  was 
pleasanter  to  work  one  lecture  than  to  keep 
several  in  hand. 

Don't  you  get  sick  to  death  of  one  lec- 
ture?— said  the  landlady's  daughter, — who  had 
a  new  dress  on  that  day,  and  was  in  spirits  for 
conversation. 


148      THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE   BREAKFAST-TABLE 

I  was  going  to  talk  about  averages, — I  said, 
— but  I  have  no  objection  to  telling  you  about 
lecturers,  to  begin  with. 

A  new  lecture  always  has  a  certain  excitement 
connected  with  its  delivery.  One  thinks  well 
of  it,  as  of  most  things  fresh  from  his  mind.  After 
a  few  deliveries  of  it,  one  gets  tired  and  then 
disgusted  with  its  repetition.  Go  on  delivering 
it,  and  the  disgust  passes  off,  until,  after  one 
has  repeated  it  a  hundred  or  a  hundred  and  fifty 
times,  he  rather  enjoys  the  hundred  and  first  or 
hundred  and  fifty-first  time,  before  a  new  au- 
dience. But  this  is  on  one  condition, — that  he 
never  lays  the  lecture  down  and  lets  it  cool.  If 
he  does, there  comes  on  a  loathing  for  it  which  is 
intense,  so  that  the  sight  of  the  old  battered 
manuscript  is  as  bad  as  sea-sickness. 

A  new  lecture  is  just  like  any  other  new  tool. 
We  use  it  for  a  while  with  pleasure.  Then  it 
blisters  our  hands,  and  we  hate  to  touch  it.  By- 
and-by  our  hands  get  callous,  and  then  we  have 
no  longer  any  sensitiveness  about  it.  But  if  we 
give  up,  the  calluses  disappear;  and  if  we  med- 
dle with  it  again,  we  miss  the  novelty  and  get 
the  blisters.  — The  story  is  often  quoted  of  White- 
field,  that  he  said  a  sermon  was  good  for  noth- 
ing until  it  had  been  preached  forty  times.  A 
lecture  doesn't  begin  to  be  old  until  it  has 
passed  its  hundredth  delivery;  and  some, I  think, 
have  doubled,  if  not  quadrupled,  that  number. 
These  old  lectures  are  a  man's  best, commonly; 
they  improve  by  age,  also, —  like  the  pipes, 
fiddles,  and  poems  I  told  you  of  the  other  day. 
One  learns  to  make  the  most  of  their  strong 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   149 

points  and  to  carry  off  their  weak  ones, — to  take 
out  the  really  good  things  which  don't  tell  on 
the  audience,  and  put  in  cheaper  things  that  do. 
All  this  degrades  him,  of  course,  but  it  improves 
the  lecture  for  general  delivery.  A  thoroughly 
popular  lecture  ought  to  have  nothing  in  it  which 
five  hundred  people  cannot  all  take  in  a  flash, 
just  as  it  is  uttered. 

— No,  indeed, —  I  should  be  very  sorry  to 
say  anything  disrespectful  of  audiences.  I  have 
been  kindly  treated  by  a  great  many,  and  may 
occasionally  face  one  hereafter.  But  I  tell  you 
the  average  intellect  of  five  hundred  persons, 
taken  as  they  come,  is  not  very  high.  It  may 
be  sound  and  safe,  so  far  as  it  goes,  but  it  is  not 
very  rapid  or  profound.  A  lecture  ought  to  be 
somethingwhich  all  can  understand, about  some- 
thing which  interests  everybody.  I  think,  that, 
if  any  experienced  lecturer  gives  you  a  different 
account  from  this,  it  will  probably  be  one  of 
those  eloquent  or  forcible  speakers  who  hold  an 
audience  by  the  charm  of  their  manner,  whatever 
they  talk  about, — even  when  they  don't  talk 
very  well. 

But  an  average,  which  was  what  I  meant  to 
speak  about,  is  one  of  the  most  extraordinary 
subjects  of  observation  and  study.  It  is  awful 
in  its  uniformity,  in  its  automatic  necessity  of 
action.  Two  communities  of  ants  or  bees  are 
exactly  alike  in  all  their  actions,  so  far  as  we 
can  see.  Two  lyceum  assemblies,  of  five  hun- 
dred each,  are  so  nearly  alike, that  they  are  ab- 
solutely undistinguishable  in  many  cases  by  any 
definite  mark, and  there  is  nothing  but  the  place 


150  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

and  time  by  which  one  can  tell  the  "remarkably 
intelligent  audience"  of  a  town  in  New  York  or 
Ohio  from  one  in  any  New  England  town  of 
similar  size.  Of  course, if  any  principle  of  selec- 
tion has  come  in,  as  in  those  special  associations 
of  young  men  which  are  common  in  cities,  it 
deranges  the  uniformity  of  the  assemblage.  But 
let  there  be  no  such  interfering  circumstances, 
and  one  knows  pretty  well  even  the  lock  the 
audience  will  have,  before  he  goes  in.  Front 
seats:  a  few  old  folks, — shiny-headed, — slant  up 
best  ear  toward  the  speaker,- -drop  off  asleep 
after  awhile,  when  the  air  begins  to  get  a  little 
narcotic  with  carbonic  acid.  Bright  women's 
faces,  young  and  middle-aged,  a  little  behind 
these,  but  toward  the  front  — (pick  out  the  best, 
and  lecture  mainly  to  that).  Here  and  there  a 
countenance  sharp  and  scholarlike,  and  a  dozen 
pretty  female  ones  sprinkled  about.  An  indefi- 
nite number  of  pairs  of  young  people, — happy, 
but  not  always  very  attentive.  Boys  in  the 
background,  more  or  less  quiet.  Dull  faces  here, 
there, — in  how  many  places!  don't  say  dull  peo- 
ple, but  faces  without  a  ray  of  sympathy  or  a 
movement  of  expression.  They  are  what  kill 
the  lecturer.  These  negative  faces  with  their 
vacuous  eyes  and  stony  lineaments  pump  and 
suck  the  warm  soul  out  of  him ; — that  is  the  chief 
reason  why  lecturers  grow  so  pale  before  the 
season  is  over.  They  render  latent  any  amount 
of  vital  caloric;  they  act  on  our  minds  as  those 
cold-blooded  creatures  I  was  talking  about  act 
on  our  hearts. 

Out  of  all  these  inevitable  elements  the  audi- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   151 

ence  is  generated, — a  great  compound  verte- 
brate, as  much  like  fifty  others  you  have  seen 
as  any  two  mammals  of  the  same  species  are  like 
each  other.  Each  audience  laughs,  and  each 
cries, in  just  the  same  place  of  your  lecture;  that 
is,  if  you  make  one  laugh  or  cry,  you  make 
all.  Even  those  little  indescribable  move- 
ments which  a  lecturer  takes  cognizance  of,  just 
as  a  driver  notices  his  horse's  cocking  his  ears, 
are  sure  to  come  in  exactly  the  same  place  of 
your  lecture,  always.  I  declare  to  you,  that, 
as  the  monk  said  about  the  picture  in  the  con- 
vent,— that  he  sometimes  thought  the  living 
tenants  were  the  shadows,  and  the  painted  fig- 
ures the  realities,  —  I  have  sometimes  felt  as  if 
I  were  a  wandering  spirit,  and  this  great  un- 
changing multivertebrate  which  I  faced  night 
after  night  was  one  ever-listening  animal,  which 
writhed  along  after  me  wherever  I  fled,  and 
coiled  at  my  feet  every  evening,  turning  up  to 
me  the  same  sleepless  eyes  which  I  thought  I  had 
closed  with  my  last  drowsy  incantation! 

Oh,  yes!  A  thousand  kindly  and  cour- 
teous acts, — a  thousand  faces  that  melted  indi- 
vidually out  of  my  recollection  as  the  April  snow 
melts,  but  only  to  steal  away  and  find  the  beds 
of  flowers  whose  roots  are  memory,  but  which 
blossom  in  poetry  and  dreams.  I  am  not  ungrate- 
ful nor  unconscious  of  all  the  good  feeling  and 
intelligence  everywhere  to  be  met  with  through 
the  vast  parish  to  which  the  lecturer  ministers. 
But  when  I  set  forth,  leading  a  string  of  my 
mind's  daughters  to  market, as  the  country-folk 
fetch  in  their  strings  of  horses Pardon  me, 


152   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

that  was  a  coarse  fellow  who  sneered  at  the  sym- 
pathy wasted  on  an  unhappy  lecturer,  as  if,  be- 
cause he  was  decently  paid  for  his  services,  he 
had  therefore  sold  his  sensibilities. — Family  men 
get  dreadfully  homesick.  In  the  remote  and 
bleak  village  the  heart  returns  to  the  red  blaze 
of  the  logs  in  one's  fireplace  at  home. 

"There  are  his  young  barbarians  all  at  play," 
— if  he  owns  any  youthful  savages. — No,  the 
world  has  a  million  roosts  for  a  man,  but  only 
one  nest. 

It  is  a  fine  thing  to  be  an  oracle  to  which  an 
appeal  is  always  made  in  all  discussions.  The 
men  of  facts  wait  their  turn  in  grim  silence,  with 
that  slight  tension  about  the  nostrils  which 
the  consciousness  of  carrying  a  "settler"  in  the 
form  of  a  fact  or  a  revolver  gives  the  individual 
thus  armed.  When  a  person  is  really  full  of  in- 
formation, and  does  not  abuse  it  to  crush  con- 
versation, his  part  is  to  that  of  the  real  talkers 
what  the  instrumental  accompaniment  is  in  a 
trio  or  quartette  of  vocalists. 

What  do  I  mean  by  the  real  talkers? — Why, 
the  people  with  fresh  ideas,  of  course,  and  plenty 
of  good  warm  words  to  dress  them  in.  Facts 
always  yield  the  place  of  honor,  in  conversation, 
to  thoughts  about  facts;  but  if  a  false  note  is 
uttered,  down  comes  the  finger  on  the  key  and 
the  man  of  facts  asserts  his  true  dignity.  I  have 
known  three  of  these  men  of  facts,  at  least,  who 
were  always  formidable, — and  one  of  them  was 
tyrannical. 

Yes,  a  man  sometimes  makes  a  grand  appear- 
ance on  a  particular  occasion ;  but  these  men 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   153 

knew  something  about  almost  everything,  and 
never  made  mistakes. — He?  Veneers  in  first- 
rate  style.  The  mahogany  scales  off  now  and 
then  in  spots,  and  then  you  see  the  cheap  light 
stuff.  1  found very  fine  in  conversa- 
tional information,  the  other  day,  when  we  were 
in  company.  The  talk  ran  upon  mountains. 
He  was  wonderfully  well  acquainted  with  the 
leading  facts  about  the  Andes,  the  Apennines, 
and  the  Appalachians;  he  had  nothing  in  par- 
ticular to  say  about  Ararat,  Ben  Nevis,  and 
various  other  mountains  that*  were  mentioned. 
By  and  by  some  Revolutionary  anecdote  came 
up,  and  he  showed  singular  familiarity  with  the 
lives  of  the  Adamses,  and  gave  many  details  re- 
lating to  Major  Andre.  A  point  of  Natural 
History  being  suggested,  he  gave  an  excellent 
account  of  the  air-bladder  of  fishes.  He  was 
very  full  upon  the  subject  of  agriculture,  but  re- 
tired from  the  conversation  when  horticulture 
was  introduced  in  the  discussion.  So  he  seemed 
well  acquainted  with  the  geology  of  anthracite, 
but  did  not  pretend  to  know  anything  of  other 
kinds  of  coal.  There  was  something  so  odd 
about  the  extent  and  limitations  of  his  knowl- 
edge, that  I  suspected  all  at  once  what  might 
be  the  meaning  of  it,  and  waited  till  I  got  an 
opportunity. — Have  you  seen  the  "New  Amer- 
ican Cyclopaedia?"  said  I.  I  have,  he  replied; 
I  received  an  early  copy. — How  far  does  it  go? 
He  turned  red,  and  answered,  To  Araguay.  Oh, 
said  I  to  myself,  not  quite  so  far  as  Ararat;  that 
is  the  reason  he  knew  nothing  about  it;  but  he 
must  have  read  all  the  rest  straight  through  and, 


154   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

if  he  can  remember  what  is  in  this  volume  until 
he  has  read  all  those  that  are  to  come,  he  will 
know  more  than  I  ever  thought  he  would. 

Since  I  had  this  experience,  I  heard  that 
somebody  else  has  related  a  similar  story.  I 
didn't  borrow  it,  for  all  that.  I  made  a  com- 
parison at  table,  some  time  since,  which  has 
often  been  quoted  and  received  many  compli- 
ments. It  was  that  of  the  mind  of  a  bigot  to  the 
pupil  of  the  eye;  the  more  light  you  pour  on  it, 
the  more  it  contracts.  The  simile  is  very  obvi- 
ous, and,  I  suppose  I  may  now  say,  a  very  happy 
one;  for  it  has  just  been  shown  me  that  it  oc- 
curs in  a  preface  to  certain  political  poerns  of 
Thomas  Moore's,  published  long  before  my  re- 
mark was  repeated.  When  a  person  of  fair 
character  for  literary  honesty  uses  an  image  such 
as  another  has  employed  before  him,  the  pre- 
sumption is  that  he  has  struck  upon  it  independ- 
ently, or  unconsciously  recalled  it,  supposing  it 
to  be  his  own. 

It  is  impossible  to  tell,  in  a  great  many  cases, 
whether  a  comparison  which  suddenly  suggests 
itself  is  a  new  conception  or  a  recollection.  I 
told  you  the  other  day  that  I  never  wrote  a  line 
of  verse  that  seemed  to  me  comparatively  good, 
but  it  appeared  old  at  once,  and  often  as  if  it  had 
been  borrowed.  But  I  confess  I  never  suspected 
the  above  comparison  of  being  old,  except  from 
the  fact  of  its  obviousness.  It  is  proper,  how- 
ever, that  I  proceed  by  a  formal  instrument  to 
relinquish  all  claim  to  any  property  in  an  idea 
given  to  the  world  at  about  the  time  when  I  had 
just  joined  the  class  in  which  Master  Thomas 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   155 

Moore  was  then  a  somewhat  advanced  scholar. 
I,  therefore,  in  full  possession  of  my  native 
honesty,  but  knowing  the  liability  of  all  men  to 
be  elected  to  public  office,  and  for  that  reason 
feeling  uncertain  how  soon  I  may  be  in  danger 
of  losing  it,  do  hereby  renounce  all  claim  to  be- 
ing considered  \hejirst  person  who  gave  utter- 
ance to  a  certain  simile  or  comparison  referred 
to  in  the  accompanying  documents,  and  relat- 
ing to  the  pupil  of  the  eye,  on  the  one  part,  and 
t.h«  mind  of  the  bigot  on  the  other.  I  hereby 
relinquish  all  glory  and  profit,  and  especially 
all  claims  to  letters  from  autograph  collectors, 
founded  upon  my  supposed  property  in  the  above 
comparison, — knowing  well,  that,  according  to 
the  laws  of  literature,  they  who  speak  first  hold 
the  fee  of  the  thing  said.  I  do  also  agree  that 
all  Editors  of  Cyclopedias  and  Biographical 
Dictionaries,  all  Publishers  of  Reviews  and 
Papers,  and  all  Critics  writing  therein,  shall  be 
at  liberty  to  retract  or  qualify  any  opinion  pred- 
icated on  the  supposition  that  I  was  the  sole 
and  undisputed  author  of  the  above  comparison. 
But,  inasmuch  as  I  do  affirm  that  the  comparison 
aforesaid  was  uttered  by  me  in  the  firm  belief 
that  it  was  new  and  wholly  my  own,  and  as  I 
have  good  reason  to  think  that  I  had  never  seen 
or  heard  it  when  first  expressed  by  me,  and  as 
it  is  well  known  that  different  persons  may  in- 
dependently utter  the  same  idea, — as  is  evinced 
by  that  familiar  line  from  Donatus, — 

"Pereant  illi  qui  ante  nos  nostra  dixerunt," — 

now,  therefore,  I  do  request  by  this  instrument 
that  all  well-disposed  persons  will  abstain   from 


156  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

asserting  or  implying  that  I  am  open  to  any  ac- 
cusation whatsoever,  touching  the  said  compari- 
son and,  if  they  have  so  asserted  or  implied,  that 
they  will  have  the  manliness  forthwith  to  retract 
the  same  assertion  or  insinuation. 

I  think  few  persons  have  a  greater  disgust  for 
plagiarism  than  myself;  if  I  had  even  suspected 
that  the  idea  in  question  was  borrowed,  I  should 
have  disclaimed  originality,  or  mentioned  the 
coincidence,  as  I  once  did  in  a  case  where  I  had 
happened  to  hit  on  an  idea  of  Swift's. — But 
what  shall  I  do  about  these  verses  I  was  going 
to  read  you?  I  am  afraid  that  half  mankind 
would  accuse  me  of  stealing  their  thoughts,  if  I 
printed  them.  I  am  convinced  that  several  of 
you,  especially  if  you  are  getting  a  little  on  in 
life,  will  recognize  some  of  these  sentiments  as 
having  passed  through  your  consciousness  at 
some  time.  I  can't  help  it, — it  is  too  late  now. 
The  verses  are  written,  and  you  must  have 
them.  Listen,  then,  and  you  shall  hear. 

WHAT  WE  ALL  THINK. 

That  age  was  older  once  than  now, 

In  spite  of  locks  untimely  shed, 
Or  silvered  on  the  youthful  brow; 

That  babes  make  love  and  children  wed. 

That  sunshine  had  a  heavenly  glow, 

Which  faded  with  those  "good  old  days," 

When  winters  came  with  deeper  snow, 
And  autumns  with  a  softer  haze. 

That — mother,  sister,  wife  or  child — 
The  "best  of  women"  each  has  known. 

Were  schoolboys  ever  half  so  wild? 

How  young  the  grandpapas  have  grown! 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE      157 

That  but  for  this  our  souls  were  free, 
And  but  for  that  our  lives  were  blest; 

That  in  some  season  yet  to  be 
Our  cares  will  leave  us  time  to  rest. 

Whene'er  we  groan  with  ache  or  pain, 
Some  common  ailment  of  the  race, — 

Though  doctors  think  the  matter  plain, — 
That  ours  is  a  "peculiar  case." 

That  when  like  babes  with  fingers  burned 
We  count  one  bitter  maxim  more, 

Our  lesson  all  the  world  has  learned, 
And  men  are  wiser  than  before. 

That  when  we  sob  o'er  fancied  woes, 

The  angels  hovering  overhead 
Count  every  pitying  drop  that  flows, 

And  love  us  for  the  tears  we  shed. 

That  when  we  stand  with  tearless  eye 
And  turn  the  beggar  from  our  door, 

They  still  approve  us  when  we  sigh, 
"Ah,  had  I  but  one  thousand  more!" 

That  weakness  smoothed  the  path  of  sin, 
In  half  the  slips  our  youth  has  known; 

And  whatsoe'er  its  blame  has  been, 
That  Mercy  flowers  on  faults  outgrown. 

Though  temples  crowd  the  crumbled  brink 

O'erhanging  truth's  eternal  flow, 
Their  tablets  bold  with  what  we  think, 

Their  echoes  dumb  to  what  we  know; 

That  one  unquestioned  text  we  read, 

All  doubt  beyond,  all  fear  above, 
Nor  crackling  pile  nor  cursing  creed 

Can  burn  or  blot  it:   GOD  IS  LOVE! 


158   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 


VII. 

(This  particular  record  is  noteworthy  princi- 
pally for  containing  a  paper  by  my  friend,  the 
Professor,  with  a  poem  or  two  annexed  or  inter- 
calated. I  would  suggest  to  young  persons  that 
they  should  pass  over  it  for  the  present,  and 
read,  instead  of  it,  that  story  about  the  young 
man  who  was  in  love  with  the  young  lady,  and 
in  great  trouble  for  something  like  nine  pages, 
but  happily  married  on  the  tenth  page  or  there- 
abouts, which,  I  take  it  for  granted,  will  b ' 
contained  in  the  periodical  where  this  is  found, 
unless  it  differ  from  all  other  publications  of  tlv 
kind.  Perhaps,  if  such  young  people  will  1  ; y 
the  number  aside,  and  take  it  up  ten  years,  or  i 
little  more,  from  the  present  time,  they  may  find 
something  in  it  for  their  advantage.  They  can't 
possibly  understand  it  all  now.) 

My  friend,  the  Professor,  began  talking  with 
me  one  day  in  a  dieary  sort  of  way.  I  couldn't 
get  at  the  difficulty  for  a  good  while,  but  at  las': 
it  turned  out  that  somebody  had  been  calling 
him  an  old  man. — He  didn't  mind  his  students 
calling  him  the  old  man,  he  said.  That  was  a 
technical  expression,  arrd  he  thought  that  he  re- 
membered hearing  it  applied  to  himself  when 
he  was  about  twenty-five.  It  may  be  considered 
as  a  familiar  and  sometimes  endearing  appella- 
tion. An  Irishwoman  calls  her  husband  "the 
old  man,"  and  he  returns  the  caressing  expres- 
sion by  speaking  of  her  as  "the  old  woman." 
But  now,  said  he,  just  suppose  a  case  like  one 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   159 

of  these.  A  young  stranger  is  overheard  talk- 
ing of  you  as  a  very  nice  old  gentleman.  A 
friendly  and  genial  critic  speaks  of  your  green 
old  age  as  illustrating  the  truth  of  some  axiom 
you  had  uttered  with  reference  to  that  period  of 
life.  What  /call  an  old  man  is  a  person  with 
a  smooth,  shining  crown  and  a  fringe  of  scat- 
tered white  hairs,  seen  in  the  streets  on  sunshiny 
days,  stooping  as  he  walks,  bearing  a  cane,  mov- 
ing cautiously  and  slowly;  telling  old  stories, 
smiling  at  present  follies,  living  in  a  narrow 
world  of  dry  habits;  one  that  remains  waking 
when  others  have  dropped  asleep,  and  keeps  a 
little  night-lamp-flame  of  fire  burning  year  after 
year,  if  the  lamp  is  not  upset,  and  there  is  only 
a  careful  hand  held  round  it  to  prevent  the  puffs 
of  wind  from  blowing  the  flames  out.  That's 
what  I  call  an  old  man. 

Now,  said  the  Professor,  you  don't  mean  to 
tell  me  that  I  have  got  to  that  yet?  Why,  bless 
you,  I  am  several  years  short  of  the  time  when 
— [I  knew  what  was  coming,  and  could  hardly 
keep  from  laughing;  twenty  years  ago  he  used 
to  quote  it  as  one  of  those  absurd  speeches  men 
of  genius  will  make,  and  now  he  is  going  to 
argue  from  it] — several  years  short  of  the  time 
when  Balzac  says  that  men  are — most — you 
know — dangerous  to — the  hearts  of — in  short, 
most  to  be  dreaded  by  duennas  that  have  charge 
of  susceptible  females. — What  age  is  that?  said 
I,  statistically.  —Fifty-two  years,  answered  the 
Professor. — Balzac  ought  to  know,  said  I,  if  it 
is  true  that  Goethe  said  of  him  that  each  of  his 
stories  must  have  been  dug  out  of  a  woman's 
heart.  But  fifty-two  is  a  high  figure. 


l6o  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Stand  in  the  light  of  the  window,  Professor, 
said  I. — The  Professor  took  up  the  desired  posi- 
tion.— You  have  white  hairs,  I  said. — Had  'em 
any  time  these  twenty  years,  said  the  Professor. 
— And  the  crow's-foot, — -pes  anserinus,  rather. 
— The  Professor  smiled,  as  I  wanted  him  to, 
and  the  folds  radiated  like  the  ridges  of  a  half- 
opened  fan,  from  the  outer  corner  of  the  eyes 
to  the  temples. — And  the  calipers,  said  I. — What 
are  the  calipers?  he  asked,  curiously. — Why, 
the  parenthesis,  said  I. — Parenthesis?  said  the 
Professor;  what's  that? — Why,  look  in  the  glass 
when  you  are  disposed  to  laugh,  and  see  if  your 
mouth  isn't  framed  in  a  couple  of  crescent 
lines, — so,  my  boy  (  ). — It's  all  nonsense,  said 
the  Professor;  just  look  at  my  biceps', — and  he 
began  pulling  off  his  coat  to  show  me  his  arm. 
— Be  careful,  said  I;  you  can't  bear  exposure 
to  the  air,  at  your  time  of  life,  as  you  could 
once. — I  will  box  with  you,  said  the  Professor, 
row  with  you,  walk  with  you,  ride  with  you, 
swim  with  you,  or  sit  at  table  with  you,  for  fifty 
dollars  a  side. — Pluck  survives  stamina,  I  an- 
swered. 

The  Professor  went  off  a  little  out  of  humor. 
A  few  weeks  afterwards  he  came  in,  looking 
very  good-natured,  and  brought  me  a  paper, 
which  I  have  here,  and  from  which  I  shall  read 
you  some  portions,  if  you  don't  object.  He  had 
been  thinking  the  matter  over,  he  said, — had 
read  Cicero  "De  Senectute,"  and  made  up  his 
mind  to  meet  old  age  half  way.  These  were 
some  of  his  reflections  that  he  had  written  down ; 
so  here  you  have 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    l6l 
THE  PROFESSOR'S  PAPER. 

There  is  no  doubt  when  old  age  begins.  The 
human  body  is  a  furnace  which  keeps  in  blast 
three-score  years  and  ten,  more  or  less.  It  burns 
about  three  hundred  pounds  of  carbon  a  year 
(besides  other  fuel)  when  in  fair  working  order, 
according  to  a  great  chemist's  estimate.  When 
the  fire  slackens,  life  declines;  when  it  goes  out, 
we  are  dead. 

It  has  been  shown  by  some  noted  French  ex- 
perimenters that  the  amount  of  combustion  in- 
creases up  to  about  the  thirtieth  year,  remains 
stationary  to  about  forty-five,  and  then  dimin- 
ishes. This  last  is  the  point  where  old  age  starts 
from.  The  great  fact  of  physical  life  is  the  per- 
petual commerce  with  the  elements,  and  the  fire 
is  the  measure  of  it. 

About  this  time  of  life,  if  food  is  plenty  where 
you  live, — for  that,  you  know,  regulates  matri- 
mony,— you  may  be  expecting  to  find  yourself 
a  grandfather  some  fine  morning;  a  kind  of 
domestic  felicity  that  gives  one  a  cold  shiver  of 
delight  to  think  of,  as  among  the  not  remotely 
possible  events. 

I  don't  mind  much  those  slipshod  lines  Dr. 
Johnson  wrote  to  Thrale,  telling  her  about  life's 
declining  from  thirty-five ;  the  furnace  is  in  full 
blast  for  ten  years  longer,  as  I  have  said.  The 
Romans  came  very  near  the  mark;  their  age  of 
enlistment  reached  from  seventeen  to  forty-six 
years. 

What  is  the  use  of  fighting  against  the  sea- 
sons, or  the  tides,  or  the  movements  of  the 


1 62   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

planetary  bodies,  or  this  ebb  in  the  wave  of  life 
that  flows  through  us?  We  aie  old  fellows  from 
the  moment  the  fire  begins  to  go  out.  Let  us 
always  behave  like  gentlemen  when  we  are  in- 
troduced to  new  acquaintance. 

Incipit  Allegoria  Senectutis. 

Old   Age,  this   is    Mr.  Professor;  Mr.   Pro- 
fessor, this  is  Old  Age. 

Old  Age. — Mr.  Professor,  I  hope  to  see  you 
well.  I  have  known  you  for  some  time,  though 
I  think  you  did  not  know  me.  Shall  we  walk 
down  the  street  together? 

Professor  (drawing  back  a  little). — We  can 
talk  more  quietly,  perhaps,  in  my  study.  Will 
you  tell  me  how  it  is  you  seem  to  be  acquainted 
with  everybody  you  are  introduced  to,  though 
he  evidently  considers  you  an  entire  stranger. 

Old  Age. — I  make  it  a  rule  never  to  force 
myself  upon  a  person's  recognition  until  I  have 
known  him  at  least^z^  years. 

Professor. — Do  you  mean  to  say  that  you  have 
known  me  so  long  as  that? 

Old  Age. — I  do.  I  left  my  card  on  you  longer 
ago  than  that,  but  I  am  afraid  you  never  read 
it;  yet  I  see  you  have  it  with  you. 

Professor.  — W  here? 

Old  Age. — There,  between  your  eyebrows, 
three  straight  lines  running  up  and  down;  all 
the  probate  courts  know  that  token, — "Old  Age, 
his  mark."  Put  your  forefinger  on  the  inner 
end  of  one  eyebrow,  and  your  middle  finger  on 
the  inner  end  of  the  other  eyebrow ;  now  sep- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   163 

arate  the  fingers,  and  you  will  smooth  out  my 
sign-manual;  that's  the  way  you  used  to  look 
before  I  left  my  card  on  you. 

Professor. — What  message  do  people  gener- 
ally send  back  when  you  first  call  on  them? 

Old  Age. — Not  at  home.  Then  I  leave  a 
card  and  go.  Next  year  I  call ;  get  the  same 
answer;  leave  another  card.  So  for  five  or  six, 
— sometimes  ten  years  or  more.  At  last,  if  they 
don't  let  me  in,  I  break  in  through  the  front 
door  or  the  windows. 

We  talked  together  in  this  way  some  time. 
Then  Old  Age  said  again, — Come,  let  us  walk 
down  the  street  together, — and  offered  me  a 
cane,  an  eye-glass,  a  tippet,  and  a  pair  of  over- 
shoes.— No,  much  obliged  to  you,  said  I.  I 
don't  want  those  things,  and  J  had  a  little  rather 
talk  with  you  here,  privately,  in  my  study.  So 
I  dressed  myself  up  in  a  jaunty  way  and  walked 
out  alone; — got  a  fall,  caught  a  cold,  was  laid 
up  with  a  lumbago,  and  had  time  to  think  over 
this  whole  matter. 

Explicit  Allegoria  Senectutis. 

We  have  settled  when  old  age  begins.  Like 
all  Nature's  processes,  it  is  gentle  and  gradual 
in  its  approaches,  strewed  with  illusions,  and  all 
its  little  griefs  soothed  by  natural  sedatives.  But 
the  iron  hand  is  not  less  irresistible  because  it 
wears  the  velvet  glove.  The  button-wood 
throws  off  its  bark  in  large  flakes,  which  one 
may  find  lying  at  its  foot,  pushed  out,  and  at 
last  pushed  off,  by  that  tranquil  movement  from 


164  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

beneath,  which  is  too  slow  to  be  seen,  but  too 
powerful  to  be  arrested.  One  finds  them  always, 
but  one  rarely  sees  them  fall.  So  it  is  our  youth 
drops  from  us — scales  off,  sapless  and  lifeless, 
and  lays  bare  the  tender  and  immature  fresh 
growth  of  old  age.  Looked  at  collectively,  the 
changes  of  old  age  appear  as  a  series  of  personal 
insults  and  indignities,  terminating  at  last  in 
death,  which  Sir  Thomas  Browne  has  called 
"the  very  disgrace  and  ignominy  of  our  na- 
tures." 

My  lady's  cheek  can  boast  no  more 
The  cranberry  white  and  pink  it  wore; 
And  where  her  shining  locks  divide, 
The  parting  line  is  all  too  wide 

No,  no — this  will  never  do.  Talk  about  men 
if  you  will,  but  spare  the  poor  women. 

We  have  a  brief  description  of  seven  stages  of 
life  by  a  remarkably  good  observer.  It  is  very 
presumptuous  to  attempt  to  add  to  it,  yet  I  have 
been  struck  with  the  fact  that  life  admits  of  a 
natural  analysis  into  no  less  than  fifteen  distinct 
periods.  Taking  the  five  primary  divisions, 
childhood,  youth,  manhood,  old  age,  each  of 
these  has  its  own  three  periods  of  immaturity, 
complete  development,  and  decline.  I  recognize 
an  old  baby  at  once, — with  its  "pipe  and  mug," 
(a  stick  of  candy  and  a  porringer) — so  does 
everybody;  and  an  old  child  shedding  its  milk 
teeth  is  only  a  little  prototype  of  the  old  man 
shedding  his  permanent  ones.  Fifty  or  there- 
abouts is  only  the  childhood,  as  it  were,  of  old 
age;  the  graybeard  youngster  must  be  weaned 


THE  AUTOCRAT  Op  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE      165 

from  his  late  suppers  now.  So  you  will  see  that 
you  have  to  make  fifteen  stages  at  any  rate,  and 
that  it  would  not  be  hard  to  make  twenty-five; 
five  primary, each  with  five  secondary  divisions. 

The  infancy  and  childhood  of  commencing 
old  age  have  the  same  ingenuous  simplicity  and 
delightful  unconsciousness  about  them  that  the 
first  stage  of  the  earlier  periods  of  life  shows. 
The  great  delusion  of  mankind  is  in  supposing 
that  to  be  individual  and  exceptional  which  is 
universal  and  according  to  law.  A  person  is 
always  startled  when  he  hears  himself  seriously 
called  an  old  man  for  the  first  time. 

Nature  gets  out  of  youth  into  manhood,  as 
sailors  are  hurried  on  board  of  vessels, — in  a  state 
of  intoxication.  We  are  hustled  into  maturity 
reeling  with  our  passions  and  imaginations,  and 
we  have  drifted  far  away  from  port  before  we 
awake  out  of  our  illusions.  But  to  carry  us  out 
of  maturity  into  old  age,  without  our  knowing 
where  we  are  going,  she  drugs  us  with  strong 
opiates,  and  so  we  stagger  along  with  wide  open 
eyes  that  see  nothing  until  snow  enough  has 
fallen  on  our  heads  to  rouse  our  comatose  brains 
out  of  their  stupid  trances. 

There  is  one  mark  of  age  that  strikes  me  more 
than  any  of  the  physical  ones; — I  mean  the 
formation  of  Habits.  An  old  man  who  shrinks 
into  himself  falls  into  ways  that  become  as  pos- 
itive and  as  much  beyond  the  reach  of  outside 
influences  as  if  they  were  governed  by  clock 
work.  The  animal  functions,  as  the  physiolo- 
gists call  them,  in  distinction  from  the  organic, 
tend,  in  the  process  of  deterioration,  to  which 


1 66   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

age  and  neglect  united  gradually  lead  them,  to 
assume  the  periodical  or  rhythmical  type  of  move- 
ment. Every  man's  heart  (this  organ  belongs, 
you  know,  to  the  organic  system)  has  a  regular 
mode  of  action;  but  I  know  a  great  many  men 
whose  brains,  and  all  their  voluntary  existence 
flowing  from  their  brains,  have  a  systole  and 
diastole  as  regular  as  that  of  the  heart  itself. 
Habit  is  the  approximation  of  the  animal  system 
to  the  organic.  It  is  a  confession  of  failure  in 
the  highest  function  of  being,  which  involves  a 
perpetual  self-determination  in  full  view  of  all 
existing  circumstances.  It  is  substituting  a  vis 
a  tergo  for  the  evolution  of  living  force. 

When  a  man, instead  of  burning  up  three  hun- 
dred pounds  of  carbon  a  year,  has  got  down  to 
two  hundred  and  fifty,  it  is  plain  enough  he  must 
economize  force  somewhere.  Now,  habit  is  a 
labor-saving  invention,  which  enables  a  man  to 
get  along  with  less  fuel, — that  is  all ;  for  fuel  is 
force,  you  know,  just  as  much  in  the  page  I  am 
writing  for  you  as  in  the  locomotive  or  the 
legs  that  carry  it  to  you.  Carbon  is  the  same 
thing,  whether  you  call  it  wood,  or  coal,  or 
bread  and  cheese.  A  reverend  gentleman  de- 
murred to  this  statement, — as  if,  because  com- 
bustion is  asserted  to  be  the  sine  qua  non  of 
thought,  therefore  thought  is  alleged  to  be  a 
purely  chemical  process.  Facts  of  chemistry 
are  one  thing,  I  told  him, and  facts  of  conscious- 
ness another.  It  can  be  proved  to  him,  by  a  very 
simple  analysis  of  some  of  his  spare  elements, 
that  every  Sunday,  when  he  does  his  duty  faith- 
fully, he  uses  up  more  phosphorus  out  of  his 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   167 

brain  and  nerves  than  on  ordinary  days.  But 
then  he  had  his  choice  whether  to  do  his  duty, 
or  to  neglect  it,  and  save  his  phosphorus  and 
other  combustibles. 

It  follows  from  all  this  that  the  formation  of 
habits  ought  naturally  to  be,  as  it  is,  the  special 
characteristic  of  age.  As  for  the  muscular  pow- 
ers, they  pass  their  maximum  long  before  the 
time  when  the  true  decline  of  life  begins,  if  we 
may  judge  by  the  experience  of  the  ring.  A 
man  is  "stale,"  I  think,  in  their  language,  soon 
after  thirty, — often,  no  doubt,  much  earlier,  as 
gentlemen  of  the  pugilistic  profession  are  apt  to 
keep  their  vital  fire  burning  -with  the  blower  up. 

So  far  without  Tully.  But  in  the  meantime 
I  have  been  reading  the  treatise,  "De  Senectute." 
It  is  not  long,  but  a  leisurely  performance. 
The  old  gentleman  was  sixty-three  years  of 
age  when  he  addressed  it  to  his  friend,  T.  Pom- 
ponius  Atticus,  Eq.,  a  person  of  distinction, 
some  two  or  three  years  older.  We  read  it  when 
we  are  schoolboys,  forget  all  about  it  for  thirty 
years,  and  then  take  it  up  again  by  a  natural 
instinct, — provided  always  that  we  read  Latin 
as  we  drink  water,  without  stopping  to  taste  it, 
as  all  of  us  who  ever  learned  it  at  school  or  col- 
lege ought  to  do. 

Cato  is  the  chief  speaker  in  the  dialogue.  A. 
good  deal  of  it  is  what  would  be  called  in  vulgar 
phrase  "slow."  It  unpacks  and  unfolds  inci- 
dental illustrations  which  a  modern  writer  would 
look  at  the  back  of,  and  toss  each  to  its  pigeon- 
hole. I  think  ancient  classics  and  ancient  peo- 
ple are  alike  in  the  tendency  to  this  kind  of  ex- 
pansion. 


1 68  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

An  old  doctor  came  to  me  once  (this  is  literal 
fact)  with  some  contrivance  or  other  for  people 
with  broken  kneepans.  As  the  patient  would 
be  confined  for  a  good  while,  he  might  find  it 
dull  work  to  sit  with  his  hands  in  his  lap.  Read- 
ing, the  ingenious  inventor  suggested,  would  be 
an  agreeable  mode  of  passing  the  time.  He 
mentioned,  in  his  written  account  of  his  contriv- 
ance, various  works  that  might  amuse  the  weary 
hour.  I  remember  only  three, — Don  Quixote, 
Tom  Jones,  and  Watts  on  the  Mind. 

It  is  not  generally  understood  that  Cicero's  es- 
say was  delivered  as  a  lyeeum  \ecture(concw pop- 
ularis]  at  the  Temple  of  Mercury.  The  journals 
(papyri]  of  the  day  ("Tempora  Quotidiana," — 
"Tribunus  Quirinalis," — "  Prasco  Romanus," 
and  the  rest)  gave  abstracts  of  it,  one  of  which 
I  have  translated  and  modernized,  as  being  a 
substitute  for  the  analysis  I  intended  to  make. 

IV.  Kal  Mart. 

The  lecture  at  the  Temple  of  Mercury,  last 
evening,  was  well  attended  by  the  elite  of  our 
great  city.  Two  hundred  thousand  sestertia 
were  thought  to  have  been  represented  in  the 
house.  The  doors  were  besieged  by  a  mob  of 
shabby  fellows  (illotum  vulgus],  who  were  at 
length  quieted  after  two  or  three  had  been  some- 
what roughly  handled  (gladto  jugulati}.  The 
speaker  was  the  well-known  Mark  Tully,  Eq., 
— the  subject,  Old  Age.  Mr.  T.  has  a  lean  and 
scraggy  person,  with  a  very  unpleasant  excres- 
cence upon  his  nasal  feature,  from  which  his 
nickname  of  Chick-pea  (Cicero)  is  said  by  some 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   1 69 

to  be  derived.  As  a  lecturer  is  public  property, 
we  may  remark  that  his  outer  garment  (toga) 
was  of  cheap  stuff  and  somewhat  worn,  and  that 
his  general  style  and  appearance  of  dress  and 
manner  (habitus ^  vestitusque]  were  somewhat 
provincial. 

The  lecture  consisted  of  an  imaginary  dialogue 
between  Cato  and  Laslius.  We  found  the  first 
portion  rather  heavy  and  retired  a  few  moments 
for  refreshment  (pocula  qucedam  vini). — All 
want  to  reach  old  age,  says  Cato,  and  grumble 
when  they  get  it;  therefore  they  are  donkeys. 
— The  lecturer  will  allow  us  to  say  that  he  is  the 
donkey;  we  know  we  shall  grumble  at  old  age, 
but  we  want  to  live  through  youth  and  manhood, 
in  s-pite  of  the  troubles  we  shall  groan  over. — 
There  was  considerable  prosing  as  to  what  old 
age  can  do  and  can't. — True,  but  not  new.  Cer- 
tainly, old  folks  can't  jump, — break  the  necks 
of  their  thigh-bones  (femorum  cervices}  if  they 
do,  can't  crack  nuts  with  their  teeth ;  can't  climb 
a  greased  pole  (malum  inunctum  scandere  non 
possunt};  but  they  can  tell  old  stories  and  give 
you  good  advice;  if  the}'  know  what  you  have 
made  up  your  mind  to  do  when  you  ask  them. 
— All  this  is  well  enough,  but  won't  set  the  Tiber 
on  fire  (  Tiber im  acccndere  nequaquam  potesf], 

There  were  some  clever  things  enough  (dicta 
hand  inept  a}  t  a  few  of  which  are  worth  report- 
ing. Old  people  are  accused  of  being  forget- 
ful; but  they  never  forget  where  they  have  put 
their  money.  CNobody  is  so  old  he  doesn't  think 
he  can  live  a  yearT^  The  lecturer  quoted  an  an- 
cient maxim, — Grow  old  early,  if  you  would 


1 70  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

be  old  long, — but  disputed  it.  Authority,  he 
thought,  was  the  chief  privilege  of  age. — It  is 
not  great  to  have  money, but  fine  to  govern  those 
who  have  it. — Old  age  begins  at  forty-six  years, 
according  to  the  common  opinion.  It  is  not  every 
kind  of  old  age  or  of  wine  that  grows  sour  with 
time.  Some  excellent  remarks  were  made  on 
immortality,  but  mainly  borrowed  from  and 
credited  to  Plato. — Several  pleasing  anecdotes 
were  told.  Old  Milo,  champion  of  the  heavy 
weights  in  his  day,  looked  at  his  arms  and  whim- 
pered, "They  are  dead."  Not  so  dead  as  you, 
you  old  fool, — says  Cato ; — you  never  were  good 
for  anything  but  for  your  shoulders  and  flanks. 
— Pisistratus  asked  Solon  what  made  him  dare 
to  be  so  obstinate.  Old  age,  said  Solon. 

The  lecture  was  on  the  whole  acceptable, 
and  a  credit  to  our  culture  and  civilization. — 
The  reporter  goes  on  to  state  that  there  will  be 
no  lecture  next  week,  on  account  of  the  expected 
combat  between  the  bear  and  the  barbarian. 
Betting  (sponsio]  two  to  one  (duo  ad  unum)  on 
the  bear. 

After  all, the  most  encouraging  things  I  find  in 
the  treatise,  "De  Senectute,"  are  the  stories  of 
men  who  have  found  new  occupations  when 
growing  old,  or  kept  up  their  common  pursuits 
in  the  extreme  period  of  life.  Cato  learned 
Greek  when  he  was  old,  and  speaks  of  wishing 
to  learn  the  fiddle,  or  some  such  instrument 
(Jld.'bris\  after  the  example  of  Socrates.  Solon 
learned  something  new,  ever}'  day,  in  his  old 
age,  as  he  gloried  to  proclaim.  Cyrus  pointed 
out  with  pride  and  pleasure  the  trees  he  had 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  17 1 

planted  with  his  own  hand.  [I  remember  a  pil- 
lar on  the  Duke  of  Northumberland's  estate  at 
Alnwick,  with  an  inscription  in  similar  words, 
if  not  the  same.  That,  like  other  country  pleas- 
ures, never  wears  out.  None  is  too  rich,  none 
too  poor,  none  too  }'oung,  none  too  old  to  en- 
joy it.]  There  is  a  New  England  story  I  have 
heard  more  to  the  point,  however,  than  any  of 
Cicero's.  A  young  farmer  was  urged  to  set  out 
some  apple  trees. — No,  said  he, they  are  too  long 
growing,  and  I  don't  want  to  plant  for  other 
people.  The  young  farmer's  father  was  spoken 
to  about  it;  but  he,  with  better  reason,  alleged 
that  apple-trees  were  slow  and  life  was  fleeting. 
At  last  some  one  mentioned  it  to  the  old  grand- 
father of  the  young  farmer.  He  had  nothing 
else  to  do,  so  he  stuck  in  some  trees.  He  lived 
long  enough  to  drink  barrels  of  cider  made  from 
the  apples  that  grew  on  those  trees. 

As  for  myself,  after  visiting  a  friend  lately, — 
[Do  remember  all  the  time  that  this  is  the  Pro- 
fessor's paper], — I  satisfied  myself  that  I  had  bet- 
ter concede  the  fact  that — my  contemporaries  are 
not  so  young  as  they  have  been, — and  that,  awk- 
ward as  it  is, — science  and  history  agree  in  tell- 
ing me  that  I  can  claim  the  immunities  and  must 
own  the  humiliations  of  the  earlystage  of  senility. 
Ah !  but  we  have  all  gone  down  the  hill  together. 
The  dandies  of  my  time  have  split  their  waist- 
bands and  taken  to  high-low  shoes.  The  beauties 
of  my  recollection— where  are  they?  They  have 
run  the  gauntlet  of  the  years  as  well  as  I.  First 
the  years  pelted  them  with  red  roses  till  their 
cheeks  were  all  on  fire.  By  and  by  they  began 


172  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST  TABLE 

throwing  white  roses,  and  that  morning  flush 
passed  away.  At  last  one  of  the  years  threw  a 
snowball,  and  after  that  no  year  let  the  poor 
girls  pass  without  throwing  snowballs.  And 
then  came  rougher  missiles, — ice  and  stones; 
and  from  time  to  time  an  arrow  whistled,  and 
down  went  one  of  the  poor  girls.  So  there  are 
but  few  left;  and  we  don't  call  those  few  girls, 
but — 

Ah,  me!  here  am  I  groaning  just  as  the 
old  Greek  sighed  At  at!  and  the  old  Roman 
Eheu!  I  have  no  doubt  we  should  die  of  shame 
and  grief  at  the  indignities  offered  us  by  age,  if 
it  were  not  that  we  see  so  many  others  as  badly 
or  worse  off  than  ourselves.  We  always  com- 
pare ourselves  with  our  contemporaries. 

[I  was  interrupted  in  my  reading  just  here. 
Before  I  began  at  the  next  breakfast,  I  read 
them  these  verses; — I  hope  you  will  like  them 
and  get  a  useful  lesson  from  them.] 

THE  LAST  BLOSSOM. 

Though  young  no  more,  we  still  would  dream 

Of  beauty's  dear  deluding  wiles; 
The  leagues  of  life  to  graybeards  seem 

Shorter  than  boyhood's  lingering  miles. 

Who  knows  a  woman's  wild  caprice? 

It  played  with  Goethe's  silvered  hair, 
And  many  a  Holy  Father's  "niece" 

Has  softly  smoothed  the  papal  chair. 

When  sixty  bids  us  sigh  in  vain 

To  melt  the  heart  of  sweet  sixteen, 
We  think  upon  those  ladies  twain 

Who  loved  so  well  the  tough  old  Dean. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   173 

We  see  the  Patriarch's  wintry  face, 

The  maid  of  Egypt's  dusky  glow, 
And  dream  that  Youth  and  Age  embrace, 

As  April  violets  fill  with  snow. 

Traced  in  her  Lord's  Olympian  smile 

His  lotus-  loving  Memphian  lies, — 
The  musky  daughters  of  the  Nile 

With  plaited  hair  and  almond  eyes. 

Might  we  but  share  one  wild  caress 

Ere  life's  autumnal  blossoms  fall, 
And  Earth's  brown,  clinging  lips  impress 

The  long  cold  kiss  that  waits  us  all! 
My  bosom  heaves,  remembering  yet 

The  morning  of  that  blissful  day 
When  Rose:  the  flower  of  spring,  I  met, 

And  gave  my  raptured  soul  away. 

Flung  from  her  eyes  of  purest  blue, 

A  lasso,  with  its  leaping  chain 
Light  as  a  loop  of  larkspurs,  flew 

O'er  sense  and  spirit,  heart  and  brain. 
Thou  com'st  to  cheer  my  waning  age, 

Sweet  vision,  waited  for  so  long! 
Dove  that  wouldst  seek  the  poet's  cage, 

Lured  by  the  magic  breath  of  song! 

She  blushes!     Ah,  reluctant  maid, 

Love's  drapeau  rouge  the  truth  has  told! 

O'er  girlhood's  yielding  barricade 

Floats  tha  great  Leveler's  crimson  fold! 

Come  to  my  arms! — love  heeds  not  years; 

No  frost  the  bud  of  passion  knows. — 
Ah!  what  is  this  rny  frenzy  hears? 

A  voice  behind  me  uttered, — Rose! 

Sweet  was  her  smile, — but  not  for  me; 

Alas,  when  woman  looks  too  kind, 
Just  turn  your  foolish  head  and  see, — 

Some  youth  is  walking  close  behind! 


174   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

As  to  giving  up  because  the  almanac  or  the 
Family  Bible  says  that  it  is  about  time  to  do  it, 
I  have  no  intention  of  doing  any  such  thing.  I 
grant  you  that  I  burn  less  carbon  than  some 
years  ago.  I  see  people  of  my  standing  really 
good  for  nothing, decrepit,  effete,  lalevre  inferi- 
eure  dcja  fendante,  with  what  little  life  they 
have  left  mainly  concentrated  in  their  epigas- 
trium. But  as  the  disease  of  old  age  is  epidemic, 
endemic,  and  sporadic,  and  everybody  that  lives 
long  enough  is  sure  to  catch  it,  I  am  going  to 
say,  for  the  encouragement  of  such  as  need  it, 
how  I  treat  the  malady  in  my  own  case. 

First.  As  I  feel,  that,  when  I  have  any- 
thing to  do,  there  is  less  time  for  it  than  when 
I  was  younger,  I  find  that  I  give  my  attention 
more  thoroughly,  and  use  my  time  more  eco- 
nomically than  ever  before;  so  that  I  can  learn 
anything  twice  as  easily  as  in  my  earlier  days. 
I  am  not,  therefore,  afraid  to  attack  a  new  study. 
I  took  up  a  difficult  language  a  very  few  years 
ago  with  good  success,  and  think  of  mathemat- 
ics and  metaphysics  by  and  by. 

Seemly-  I  have  opened  my  eyes  to  a  good 
many  neglected  privileges  and  pleasures  within 
my  reach,  and  requiring  only  a  little  courage  to 
enjoy  them.  You  may  well  suppose  it  pleased 
me  to  find  that  old  Cato  was  thinking  of  learn- 
ing to  play  the  fiddle,  when  I  had  deliberately 
taken  it  up  in  my  old  age,  and  satisfied  myself 
that  I  could  get  much  comfort,  if  not  much 
music,  out  of  it. 

Thirdly.,.  I  have  found  that  some  of  those 
active  exercises,  which  are  commonly  thought 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   175 

to  belong  to  young  folks  only,  may  be  enjoyed 
at  a  much  later  period. 

A  young  friend  has  lately  written  an  admira- 
ble article  in  one  of  the  journals,  entitled,  "  Saints 
and  their  Bodies."  Approving  of  his  general 
doctrines,  and  grateful  for  his  records  of  per- 
sonal experience,  I  cannot  refuse  to  add  my 
own  experimental  confirmation  of  his  eulogy  of 
one  particular  form  of  active  exercise  and  amuse- 
ment, namely,  boating.  For  the  past  nine  years, 
I  have  rowed  about  during  a  good  part  of 
the  summer,  on  fresh  or  salt  water  My  pres- 
ent fleet  on  the  river  Charles  consists  of  three 
row-boats.  I.  A  small  flat-bottomed  skiff  of  the 
shape  of  a  flatiron,  kept  mainly  to  lend  to  boys. 

2.  A  fancy  "dory"  for  two  pairs  of    sculls,  in 
which  I  sometimes  go  out  with  my  young  folks. 

3.  My  own  particular  water-sulky,  a  "skeleton" 
or  "shell"  race-boat,  twenty-two  feet  long,  with 
huge  outriggers,  which  boat  I  pull  with  ten-foot 
sculls, — alone,  of  course,  as  it    holds    but  one, 
and  tips  him  out,  if  he  doesn't  mind  what  he  is 
about.      In    this  I  glide  around  the   Black  Bay, 
down  the  stream,  up  the  Charles  to  Cambridge 
and   Watertown,    up    the    Mystic,    round    the 
wharves,    in   the   wake    of   steamboats — which 
have  a  swell  after  them  delightful  to  rock  upon ; 
I  linger  under  the   bridges, — those   "caterpillar 
bridges,"  as  my   brother  Professor  so    happily 
called  them;  rub  against  the  black   sides  of  old 
wood-schooners;     cool    down   under   the  over- 
hanging stern  of   some   tall   India-man ;  stretch 
across  to  the  Navy-Yard,    where   the   sentinel 
warns  me  off  from  the  Ohio, — just  as  if  I  should 


1 76  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

hurt  her  by  lying  in  her  shadow;  then  strike  out 
into  the  harbor,  where  the  water  gets  clear  and 
the  air  smells  of  the  ocean, — till  all  at  once  I 
remember,  that,  if  a  west  wind  blows  up  of  a 
sudden,  I  shall  drift  along  past  the  islands,  out 
of  sight  of  the  dear  old  State-house, — plate, 
tumbler,  knife  and  fork  all  waiting  at  home,  but 
no  chair  drawn  up  at  the  table, T— all  the  dear 
people  waiting,  waiting,  waiting,  while  the  boat 
is  sliding,  sliding,  sliding  into  the  great  deseit, 
where  there  is  no  tree  and  no  fountain.  As  I 
don't  want  my  wreck  to  be  washed  up  on  one 
of  the  beaches  in  company  with  devils'-aprons, 
bladder-weeds,  dead  horse-shoes,  and  bleached 
crab-shells,  I  turn  about  and  flap  my  long,  nar- 
row wings  for  home.  When  the  tide  is  running 
out  swiftly,  I  have  a  splendid  fight  to  get  through 
the  bridges,  but  always  make  it  a  rule  to  beat, 
— though  I  have  been  jammed  up  into  pretty  tight 
places  at  times,  and  was  caught  once  between 
a  vessel  swinging  round  and  the  pier,  until  our 
bones  (the  boat's,  that  is)  cracked  as  if  we  had 
been  in  the  jaws  of  Behemoth.  Then  back  to 
my  moorings  at  the  foot  of  the  Common,  off 
with  the  rowing-dress,  dash  under  the  green, 
translucent  wave,  return  to  the  garb  of  civiliza- 
tion, walk  through  the  Garden,  take  a  look  at 
my  elms  on  the  Common,  and,  reaching  my 
habitat,  in  consideration  of  my  advanced  period 
of  life,  indulge  in  the  Elysian  abandonment  of 
a  huge  recumbent  chair. 

When  I  have  established  a  pair  of  well-pro- 
nounced feathering-callouses  on  my  thumbs, 
when  I  am  in  training  so  that  I  can  do  my  fif- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   177 

teen  miles  at  a  stretch  without  coming  to  grief 
in  any  way,  when  I  can  perform  my  mile  in 
eight  minutes  or  a  little  less,  then  I  feel  as  if  I 
had  old  Time's  head  in  Chancery,  and  could 
give  it  to  him  at  my  leisure. 

I  do  not  deny  the  attraction  of  walking.  I 
have  bored  this  ancient  city  through  and  through 
in  my  daily  travels,  until  I  know  it  as  an  old 
inhabitant  of  a  Cheshire  knows  his  cheese.  Why, 
it  was  I  who,  in  the  course  of  these  rambles, 
discovered  that  remarkable  avenue  called  Myrtle 
Street^  stretching  in  one  long  line  from  east  of 
the  Reservoir  to  a  precipitous  and  rudely  paved 
cliff  which  looks  down  on  the  grim  abode  of 
Science,  and  beyond  it  to  the  far  hills;  a  prom- 
enade so  delicious  in  its  repose,  so  cheerfully 
varied  with  glimpses  down  the  northern  slope 
into  busy  Cambridge  Street  with  its  iron  river 
of  the  horse-railroad,  and  wheeled  barges  glid- 
ing back  and  forward,  over  it, — so  delightfully 
closing  at  its  western  extremity  in  sunny  courts 
and  passages  where  I  know  peace  and  beauty, 
and  virtue,  and  serene  old  age  must  be  perpetual 
tenants, — so  alluring  to  all  who  desire  to  take 
their  daily  stroll,  in  the  words  of  Dr.  Watts, — 

"Alike  unknowing  and  unknown," — 

that  nothing  but  a  sense  of  duty  would  have 
prompted  me  to  reveal  the  secret  of  its  existence. 
I  concede,  therefore,  that  walking  is  an  im- 
measurably fine  invention,  of  which  old  age 
ought  constantly  to  avail  itself. 

Saddle-leather  is  in  some  respects  even  prefer- 
able to  sole-leather.  The  principal  objection  to 
it  is  of  a  financial  character.  But  you  may  be 


178  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

sure  that  Bacon  and  Sydenham  did  not  recom- 
mend it  for  nothing.  One's  hepar,  or  in  vulgar 
language,  liver, — a  ponderous  organ,  weighing 
some  three  or  four  pounds,  goes  up  and  down 
like  the  dasher  of  a  churn  in  the  midst  of  the 
other  vital  arrangements  at  every  step  of  a  trot- 
ting horse.  The  brains  also  are  shaken  up  like 
coppers  in  a  money-box.  Riding  is  good  for 
those  that  are  born  with  a  silver-mounted  bridle 
in  their  hand,  and  can  ride  as  much  and  as  often 
as  they  like,  without  thinking,  all  the  time  they 
hear  that  steady  grinding  sound  as  the  horse's 
jaws  triturate  with  calm  lateral  movement  the 
bank-bills  and  promises  to  pay  upon  which  it  is 
notorious  that  the  profligate  animal  in  question 
feeds  day  and  night. 

Instead,  however,  of  considering  these  kinds 
of  exercise  in  this  empirical  way,  I  will  devote 
a  brief  space  to  an  examination  of  them  in  a 
more  scientific  form. 

The  pleasure  of  exercise  is  due  first  to  a  purely 
physical  impression,  and  secondly  to  a  sense  of 
power  in  action.  The  first  source  of  pleasure 
varies,  of  course,  with  our  condition  and  the 
state  of  the  surrounding  circumstances;  the  sec- 
ond with  the  amount  and  kind  of  power,  and  the 
extent  and  kind  of  action.  In  all  forms  of  active 
exercise  there  are  three  powers  simultaneously 
in  action — the  will,  the  muscles,  and  the  intel- 
lect. Each  of  these  predominates  in  different 
kinds  of  exercise.  In  walking,  the  will  and 
muscles  are  so  accustomed  to  work  together  and 
perform  their  task  with  so  little  expenditure  of 
force,  that  the  intellect  is  left  comparatively  free. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   179 

The  mental  pleasure  in  walking,  as  such,  is  in 
the  sense  of  power  over  all  our  moving  machin- 
ery. But  in  riding,  I  have  the  additional  pleas- 
ure of  governing  another  will,  and  my  muscles 
extend  to  the  tips  of  the  animal's  ears  and  to  his 
four  hoofs,  instead  of  stopping  at  my  hands  and 
feet.  Now  in  this  extension  of  my  volition  and 
my  physical  frame  into  another  animal, my  tyran- 
nical instincts  and  my  desire  for  heroic  strength 
are  at  once  gratified.  When  the  horse  ceases 
to  have  a  will  of  his  own  and  his  muscles  require 
no  special  attention  on  your  part,  then  you  may 
live  on  horseback,  as  Wesley  did,  and  write  ser- 
mons, or  take  naps,  as  you  like.  But  you  will 
observe,  that,  in  riding  on  horseback,  you  always 
have  a  feeling,  that,  after  all,  it  is  not  you  that 
did  the  work,  but  the  animal,  and  this  prevents 
the  satisfaction  from  being  complete. 

Now,  let  us  look  at  the  conditions  of  rowing. 

I  won't  suppose  you  to  be  disgracing  yourself 
in  one  of  those  miserable  tubs,  tugging  in  which 
is  to  rowing  the  true  boat  what  riding  a  cow  is 
to  be  striding  an  Arab.  You  know  the  Esquimaux 
kayak  (if  that  is  the  name  of  it),  don't  you? 
Look  at  that  model  of  one  over  my  door.  Sharp, 
rather? — On  the  contrary,  it  is  a  lubber  to  the 
one  you  and  I  must  have;  a  Dutch  fish-wife  to 
Psyche,  contrasted  with  what  I  will  tell  you 
about.  Our  boat,  then,  is  something  of  the  shape 
of  a  pickerel,  as  you  look  down  upon  his  back, 
he  lying  in  the  sunshine  just  where  the  sharp 
edge  of  the  water  cuts  in  among  the  lily-pads. 
It  is  a  kind  of  a  giant  pod,  as  one  may  say, — 
tight  everywhere,  except  in  a  little  place  in  the 


l8o   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

middle,  where  you  sit,  Its  length  is  from  seven 
to  ten  yards,  and  as  it  is  only  from  sixteen  to 
thirty  inches  wide,  in  its  widest  part,  you  un- 
derstand why  you  want  those  "outiiggers,"  or 
projecting  iron-frames  with  the  rowlocks,  in 
which  the  oars  play.  My  rowlocks  are  five 
feet  apart ;  double  or  more  than  double  the  great- 
est width  of  the  boat. 

Here  you  aie,  then,  afloat  with  a  body  a  rod 
and  a  half  long,  with  arms, or  wings,  as  you  may 
choose  to  call  them,  stretching  more  than  twenty- 
five  feet  from  tip  to  tip ;  every  volition  of  yours 
extending  as  perfectly  into  them  as  if  your  spinal 
cord  ran  down  the  center  strip  of  your  boat,  and 
the  nerves  of  your  arms  tingled  as  far  as  the 
broad  blades  of  your  oars, — oars  of  spruce, 
balanced,  leathered,  and  ringed  under  your  own 
special  direction.  This,  in  sober  earnest,  is  the 
nearest  approach  to  flying  that  man  has  ever 
made  or  perhaps  ever  will  make.  As  the  hawk 
sails,  without  flapping  his  pinions,  so  you  drift 
with  the  tide  when  you  will,  in  the  most  luxuri- 
ous form  of  locomotion  indulged  to  an  embodied 
spirit.  But  if  your  blood  wants  rousing,  turn 
round  that  stake  in  the  river,  which  you  see  a 
mile  from  here ;  and  when  you  come  in  in  sixteen 
minutes  (if  you  do,  for  we  are  old  boys,  and  not 
champion  sculleis,  you  remember),  then  say  if 
you  begin  to  feel  a  little  warmed  up  or  not! 
You  can  row  easily  and  gently  all  day,  and  you 
can  row  yourself  blind  and  black  in  the  face  in 
ten  minutes,  just  as  you  like.  It  has  been  long 
agreed  that  there  is  no  way  in  which  a  man  can 
accomplish  so  much  labor  with  his  muscles,  as 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   l8l 

in  rowing.  It  is  in  the  boat,  then,  that  man 
finds  the  largest  extension  of  his  volitional  and 
muscular  existence;  and  yet  he  may  tax  both 
of  them  so  slightly,  in  that  most  delicious  of  ex- 
ercises, that  he  shall  mentally  write  his  sermon, 
or  his  poem,  or  reca'll'the  remarks  he  has  made 
in  company  and  put  them  in  form  for  the  public, 
as  well  as  in  his  easy  chair. 

I  dare  not  publicly  name  the  rare  joys,  the 
infinite  delights,  that  intoxicate  me  on  some  sweet 
June  morning,  when  the  river  and  bay  are  smooth 
as  a  sheet  of  beryl  green  silk,  and  I  run  along 
ripping  it  up  with  my  knife-edged  shell  of  a 
boat,  the  rent  closing  after  me  like  those  wounds 
of  angels  which  Milton  tells  of,  but  the  seam 
still  shining  for  many  a  long  rod  behind  me. 
To  lie  still  ovei  the  Flats,  where  the  waters  are 
shallow,  and  see  the  crabs  crawling,  and  the 
sculpins  gliding  busily  and  silently  beneath  the 
boat, — to  rustle  in  through  the  long,  harsh  grass, 
that  leads  up  some  tranquil  creek, — to  take  shel- 
ter from  the  sunbeams  under  one  of  the  thousand- 
footed  bridges,  and  look  down  its  interminable 
colonnades,  crusted  with  green  and  oozy 
growths,  studded  with  minute  barnacles,  and 
belted  with  rings  of  dark  mussels,  while  over- 
head streams  and  thunders  that  other  river  whose 
every  wave  is  a  human  soul  flowing  to  eternity, 
as  the  river  below  flows  to  the  ocean, — lying 
there  moored  unseen,  in  loneliness  so  profound 
that  the  columns  of  Tadmor  in  the  Desert  could 
not  seem  more  remote  from  life, — the  cool  breeze 
on  one's  forehead,  the  stream  whispering  against 
the  half-sunken  pillars, — why  should  I  tell  of 


1 82   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

these  things,  that  I  should  live  to  see  my  beloved 
haunts  invaded  and  the  waves  blackened  with 
boats  as  with  a  swarm  of  water  beetles?  What 
a  city  of  idiots  we  must  be  not  to  have  covered 
this  glorious  bay  with  gondolas  and  wherries, 
as  we  have  just  learned  to  Cover  the  ice  in  win- 
ter with  skaters! 

I  am  satisfied  that  such  a  set  of  black-coated, 
stiff-jointed,  soft-muscled,  paste-complexioned 
youth  as  we  can  boast  in  our  Atlantic  cities  nev,er 
before  sprang  from  loins  of  Anglo-Saxon  lineage. 
Of  the  females  that  are  the  mates  of  these  males 
I  do  not  here  speak.  I  preached  my  sermon 
from  the  lay-pulpit  on  this  matter  a  good  while 
ago.  Of  course,  if  you  heard  it,  you  know  that 
my  belief  is  that  the  total  climatic  influences 
here  are  getting  up  a  number  of  new  patterns  of 
humanity,  some  of  which  are  not  an  improve- 
ment on  the  old  model.  Clipper-built,  sharp  in 
the  bows,  long  in  the  spars,  slender  to  look  at 
and  fast  to  go,  the  ship,  which  is  the  present 
great  organ  of  our  national  life  of  relation,  is 
but  a  reproduction  of  the  typical  form  which  the 
elements  impress  upon  its  builder.  All  this  we 
cannot  help;  but  we  can  make  the  best  of  these 
influences,  such  as  they  are.  We  have  a  few 
good  boatmen, — no  good  horsemen  that  I  hear 
of, — nothing  remarkable,  I  believe,  in  cricket- 
ing,— and  as  for  any  great  athletic  feat  per- 
formed by  a  gentleman  in  these  latitudes,  society 
would  drop  a  man  who  should  run  round  the 
Common  in  five  minutes.  Some  of  our  amateur 
fencers,  single-stick  players,  and  boxers,  we 
have  no  reason  to  be  ashamed  of.  Boxing  is 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   183 

rough  play,  but  not  too  rough  for  a  hearty  young 
fellow.  Anything  is  better  than  this  white- 
blooded  degeneration  to  which  we  all  tend. 

I  dropped  into  a  gentleman's  sparring  exhibi- 
tion only  last  evening.  It  did  my  heart  good  to 
see  that  there  were  a  few  young  and  -youngish 
3'outh  left  who  could  take  care  o  ftheir  own  heads 
in  case  of  emergency.  It  is  a  fine  sight,  that 
of  a  gentleman  resolving  himself  into  the  primi- 
tive constituents  of  his  humanity.  Here  is  a 
delicate  young  man  now,  with  an  intellectual 
countenance,  a  slight  figure,  a  sub-pallid  com- 
plexion, a  most  unassuming  deportment,  a  mild 
adolescent  in  fact,  that  any  Hiram  01  Jonathan 
from  between  the  plough-tails  would,  of  course, 
expect  to  handle  with  perfect  ease.  Oh,  he  is 
taking  off  his  gold-bowed  spectacles!  Ah,  he 
is  divesting  himself  of  his  cravat!  Why,  he  is 
stripping  off  his  coat !  Well,  here  he  is,  sure 
enough,  in  a  tight  silk  shirt,  and  with  two  things 
that  look  like  batter-puddings  in  the  place  of  his 
fists.  Now,  see  that  other  fellow  with  another 
pair  of  batter-puddings — the  big  one  with  the 
broad  shoulders;  he  will  certainly  knock  the 
little  man's  head  off,  if  he  strikes  him.  Feint- 
ing, stopping,  dodging,  hitting,  countering, — 
little  man's  head  not  off  yet.  You  might  as  well 
try  to  jump  upon  your  own  shadow  as  to  hit  the 
little  man's  intellectual  features.  He  needn't 
have  taken  off  the  gold-bowed  spectacles  at  all. 
Quick,  cautious,  shifty,  nimble,  cool,  he  catches 
all  the  fierce  lunges  or  gets  out  of  their  reach, 
till  his  turn  comes,  and  then,  whack  goes  one 
of  the  batter-puddings  against  the  big  one's  ribs, 


184  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

and  bang  goes  the  other  into  the  big  one's  face, 
and  staggering,  shuffling,  slipping,  tripping, 
collapsing,  sprawling,  down  goes  the  big  one 
in  a  miscellaneous  bundle. — If  my  young  friend, 
whose  excellent  article  I  have  referred  to,  could 
only  introduce  the  manly  art  of  self-defense 
among  the  clergy,  I  am  satisfied  that  we  should 
have  better  sermons  and  an  infinitely  less  quar- 
relsome church  militant.  About  with  the  gloves 
would  let  off  the  ill-nature,  and  cure  the  indi- 
gestion, which,  united,  have  embroiled  their 
subjects  in  a  bitter  controversy.  We  should  then 
often  hear  that  a  point  of  difference  between  an 
infallible  and  a  heretic,  instead  of  being  vehe- 
mently discussed  in  a  series  of  newspaper  arti- 
cles, had  been  settled  by  a  friendly  contest  in 
several  rounds,  at  the  close  of  which  the  parties 
shook  hands  and  appeared  cordially  reconciled. 

But  boxing  you  and  I  are  too  old  for,  I  am 
afraid.  I  was  for  a  moment  tempted,  by  the 
contagion  of  muscular  electricity  last  evening, 
to  try  the  gloves  with  the  Benicia  Boy,  who 
looked  in  as  a  friend  to  the  noble  art;  but  re- 
membering that  he  had  twice  my  weight  and 
half  my  age,  besides  the  advantage  of  his  train- 
ing, I  sat  still  and  said  nothing. 

There  is  one  other  delicate  point  I  wish  to 
speak  of  with  reference  to  old  age.  I  refer  to 
the  use  of  dioptric  media  which  correct  the 
diminishing  refracting  power  of  the  humors  of 
the  eye, — in  other  words,  spectacles.  I  don't 
use  them.  All  I  ask  is  a  large,  fair  type,  a 
strong  daylight  or  gas  light,  and  one  yard  of 
focal  distance,  and  my  eyes  are  as  good  as  ever. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  185 

But  if  your  eyes  fail,  I  can  tell  you  something 
encouraging.  There  is  now  living  in  New 
York  State  an  old  gentleman  who,  perceiving 
his  sight  to  fail,  immediately  took  to  exercising 
it  on  the  finest  print,  and  in  this  way  fairly  bul- 
lied Nature  out  of  her  foolish  habit  of  taking 
liberties  at  five-and-forty — or  thereabouts.  And 
now  this  old  gentleman  performs  the  most  ex- 
traordinary feats  with  his  pen,  showing  that  his 
eyes  must  be  a  pair  of  microscopes.  I  should 
be  afraid  to  say  to  you  how  much  he  writes  in 
the  compass  of  a  half-dime, — whether  the  Psalms 
or  the  Gospels,  or  the  Psalms  and  the  Gospels, 
I  won't  be  positive. 

But  now,  let  me  tell  you  this.  If  the  time 
comes  when  you  must  lay  down  the  riddle  and 
the  bow,  because  your  fingers  are  too  stiff,  and 
drop  the  ten-foot  sculls,  because  your  arms  are 
too  weak,  and  after  dallying  awhile  with  eye- 
glasses, come  at  last  to  the  undisguised  reality  of 
spectacles, — if  the  time  comes  when  that  fire  of 
life  we  spoke  of  has  burned  so  low  that  where 
its  flames  reverberated  there  is  only  the  somber 
stain  of  regret,  and  where  its  coals  glowed,  only 
the  white  ashes  that  cover  the  embers  of  mem- 
ory,— don't  let  your  heart  grow  cold,  and  you 
may  carry  cheerfulness  and  love  with  you  into 
the  teens  of  your  second  century,  if  you  can  last 
so  long.  As  our  friend,  the  Poet,  once  said  in 
some  of  those  old-fashioned  heroics  of  his  which 
he  keeps  for  his  private  reading, — 

Call  him  not  old,  whose  visionary  brain 
Holds  o'er  the  past  its  undivided  reign. 


1  86  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

For  him  in  vain  the  envious  seasons  roll 

Who  bears  eternal  summer  in  his  soul. 

If  yet  the  minstrel's  song,  the  poet's  lay, 

Spring  with  her  birds,  or  children  with  their  play, 

Or  maiden's  smile,  or  heavenly  dream  of  art 

Stir  the  few  life-drop  screeping  round  his  heart,  — 

Turn  to  the  record  where  his  years  are  told,  — 

Count  his  gray  hairs,  —  they  cannot  make  him  old! 

End  of  the  Professors 


[The  above  essay  was  not  read  at  one  time, 
but  in  several  installments,  and  accompanied  by 
various  comments  from  different  persons  at  the 
table.  The  company  were  in  the  main  attentive, 
with  the  exception  of  a  little  somnolence  on  the 
part  of  the  old  gentleman  opposite  at  times,  and 
a  few  sly,  malicious  questions  about  the  "old 
boys"  on  the  part  of  that  forward  young  fellow 
who  has  figured  occasionally,  not  always  to  his 
advantage,  in  these  reports. 

On  Sunday  mornings,  in  obedience  to  a  feel- 
ing I  am  not  ashamed  of,  I  have  always  tried  to 
give  a  more  appropriate  character  to  our  conver- 
sation. I  have  never  read  them  my  sermon  yet, 
and  I  don't  know  that  I  shall,  as  some  of  them 
might  take  my  convictions  as  a  personal  indig- 
nity to  themselves.  But  having  read  our  Com- 
pany so  much  of  the  Professor's  talk  about  age 
and  other  subjects  connected  with  physical  life, 
I  took  the  next  Sunday  to  repeat  to  them  the 
following  poem  of  his,  which  I  have  had  by  me 
some  time.  He  calls  it  —  I  suppose  for  his  pro- 
fessional friends  —  THE  ANATOMIST'S  HYMN;  but 
I  shall  name  it  —  ] 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE      187 
THE  LIVING  TEMPLE. 

Not  in  the  world  of  light  alone, 

Where  God  has  built  his  blazing  throne, 

Nor  yet  alone  in  earth  below, 

With  belted  seas  that  come  and  go, 

And  endless  isles  of  sunlit  green, 

Is  all  thy  Maker's  glory  seen : 

Look  in  upon  thy  wondrous  frame, — 

Eternal  wisdom  still  the  same ! 

The  smooth,  soft  air  with  pulse-like  waves 
Flows  murmuring  through  its  hidden  caves, 
Whose  streams  of  brightening  purple  rush 
Fired  with  a  new  and  livelier  blush, 
While  all  their  burden  of  decay 
The  ebbing  current  steals  away, 
And  red  with  Nature's  flame  they  start 
From  the  warm  fountains  of  the  heart. 

No  rest  that  throbbing  slave  may  ask, 
Forever  quivering  o'er  his  task, 
While  far  and  wide  a  crimson  jet 
Leaps  forth  to  fill  the  woven  net 
Which  in  unnumbered  crossing  tides 
The  flood  of  burning  life  divides, 
Then  kindling  each  decaying  part 
Creeps  back  to  find  the  throbbing  heart. 

But  warned  with  that  unchanging  flame 
Behold  the  outward  moving  frame, 
Its  living  marbles  jointed  strong 
With  glistening  band  and  silvery  thong, 
And  linked  to  reason's  guiding  reins 
By  myriad  rings  in  trembling  chains, 
Each  graven  with  the  threaded  zone 
Which  claims  it  as  the  master's  own. 


1 88  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

See  how  yon  beam  of  seeming  white 
Is  braided  out  of  seven-hued  light, 
Yet  in  those  lucid  globes  no  ray 
By  any  chance  shall  break  astray. 
Hark  how  the  rolling  surge  of  sound, 
Arches  and  spirals  circling  round, 
Wakes  the  hushed  spirit  through  thine  ear 
With  music  it  is  heaven  to  hear. 

Then  mark  the  cloven  sphere  that  holds 
All  thought  in  its  mysterious  folds, 
That  feels  sensation's  faintest  thrill 
And  flashes  forth  the  sovereign  will  ;• 
Think  on  the  stormy  world  that  dwells 
Locked  in  its  dim  and  clustering  cells! 
The  lightning  gleams  of  power  it  sheds 
Along  its  slender  glassy  threads! 

O  Father!  grant  thy  love  divine 
To  make  these  mystic  temples  thine! 
When  wasting  age  and  wearying  strife 
Have  sapped  the  leaning  walls  of  life, 
When  darkness  gathers  over  all, 
And  the  last  tottering  pillars  fall, 
Take  the  poor  dust  thy  mercy  warms 
And  mould  it  into  heavenly  forms! 


VIII. 

[Spring  has  come.  You  will  find  some  verses 
to  that  effect  at  the  end  'of  these  notes.  If  you 
are  an  impatient  reader,  skip  to  them  at  once. 
In  reading  aloud,  omit,  if  you  please,  the  sixth 
and  seventh  verses.  These  are  parenthetical 
and  digressive,  and  unless  your  audience  is  of 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   189 

superior  intelligence,  will  confuse  them.  Many 
people  can  ride  on  horseback  who  find  it  hard 
to  get  on  and  off  without  assistance.  One  has 
to  dismount  from  an  idea  and  get  into  the  saddle 
again  at  every  parenthesis.] 

The  old  gentleman  who  sits  opposite,  finding 
that  spring  had  fairly  come,  mounted  a  white 
hat  one  day,  and  walked  into  the  street.  It 
seems  to  have  been  a  premature  or  otherwise 
exceptionable  exhibition,  not  unlike  that  com- 
memorated by  the  late  Mr.  Bayly.  When  the 
old  gentleman  came  home  he  looked  red  in  the 
face  and  complained  that  he  had  been  "made 
sport  of."  By  sympathizing  questions  I  learned 
from  him  that  a  boy  had  called  him  "old 
daddy,"  and  asked  him  when  he  had  his  hat 
whitewashed. 

This  incident  Jed  me  to  make  some  observa- 
tions at  table  the  next  morning,  which  I  here 
repeat  for  the  benefit  of  the  readers  of  this  record. 

The  hat  is  the  vulnerable  point  of  the  artificial 
integument.  I  learned  this  in  early  boyhood. 
I  was  once  equipped  in  a  hat  of  Leghorn  straw, 
having  a  brim  of  much  wider  dimensions  than 
were  usual  at  that  time,  and  sent  to  school  in 
that  portion  of  my  native  town  which  lies  near- 
est to  this  metropolis.  On  my  way  I  was  met 
by  a  "Port-chuck,"  as  we  used  to  call  the  young 
gentlemen  of  that  locality,  and  the  following 
dialogue  ensued: 

The  Port-chuck.  Hullo,  you-sir,  joo  you 
know  th'  was  gon-to  be  a  race  to-morrah? 

Myself.  No.  Who's  gon-to  run,  V  wher's't 
gon-to  be? 


IpO  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

The  Port-chuck.  Squire  Mycall  and  Doctor 
Williams,  round  the  brim  o'  your  hat. 

These  two  much-respected  gentlemen  being 
the  oldest  inhabitants  at  that  time,  and  the  alleged 
race-course  being  out  of  the  question,  the  Port- 
chuck  also  winking  and  thrusting  his  tongue 
into  his  cheek,  I  perceived  that  I  had  been  trifled 
with,  and  the  effect  has  been  to  make  me  sen- 
sitive and  observant  respecting  this  article  of 
dress  ever  since.  Here  is  an  axiom  or  two  re- 
lating to  it: 

A  hat  that  has  been  popped,  or  exploded  by 
being  sat  down  upon,  is  never  itself  again  after- 
wards. 

It  is  a  favorite  illusion  of  sanguine  natures  to 
believe  the  contrary. 

Shabby  gentility  has  nothing  so  characteristic 
as  its  hat.  There  is  always  an  unnatural  calmness 
about  its  nap,  and  an  unwholesome  gloss,  sug- 
gestive of  a  wet  brush. 

The  last  effort  of  decayed  fortune  is  expended 
in  smoothing  its  dilapidated  castor.  The  hat  is 
the  ultimum  moriens  of  "respectability." 

The  old  gentleman  took  all  these  remarks  and 
maxims  very  pleasantly,  saying,  however,  that 
he  had  forgotten  most  of  his  French,  except 
the  word  for  potatoes, — pummies  de  tare.  Ulti- 
mum moriens,  I  told  him,  is  old  Italian,  and  sig- 
nifies last  thing  to  die.  With  this  explanation 
he  was  well  contented,  and  looked  quite  calm 
when  I  saw  him  afterwards  in  the  entry  with 
a  black  hat  on  his  head  and  the  white  one  in  his 
hand. 

I  think  myself  fortunate  in  having   the 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   19 1 

and  the  Professor  for  my  intimates.  We  are  so 
much  together,  that  we  no  doubt  think  and  talk 
a  good  deal  alike;  yet  our  points  of  view  are  in 
many  respects  individual  and  peculiar.  You 
know  me  well  enough  by  this  time.  I  have  not 
talked  with  you  so  long  for  nothing,  and  there- 
fore I  don't  think  it  necessary  to  draw  my  own 
portrait.  But  let  me  say  a  word  or  two  about 
my  friends. 

The  Professor  considers  himself,  and  I  con- 
sider him,  a  very  useful  and  worthy  kind  of 
drudge.  I  think  he  has  a  pride  in  his  small 
technicalities.  I  know  that  he  has  a  great  idea 
of  fidelity;  and  though  I  suspect  he  laughs  a 
little  inwardly  at  times  at  the  grand  airs  "Sci- 
ence" puts  on,  as  she  stands  marking  time,  but 
not  getting  on,  while  the  trumpets  are  blowing 
and  the  big  drums  beating, — yet  I  am  sure  he 
has  a  liking  for  his  specialty,  and  a  respect  for 
its  cultivators. 

But  I'll  tell  you  what  the  Professor  said  to 
the  Poet  the  other  day. — My  boy,  said  he,  I  can 
work  a  great  deal  cheapei  than  you,  because  I 
keep  all  m}-  goods  in  the  lower  story.  You  have 
to  hoist  yours  into  the  uppei  chambers  of  the 
brain,  and  let  them  down  again  to  your  custom- 
ers. I  take  mine  in  at  the  level  of  the  ground 
and  send  them  off  from  my  doorstep  almost 
without  lifting.  I  tell  you  the  higher  a  man  has 
to  carry  the  raw  material  of  thought  before  he 
works  it  up,  the  more  it  costs  him  in  blood,  nerve, 
and  muscle.  Coleridge  knew  all  this  very  well 
when  he  advised  every  literary  man  to  have  a 
profession. 


I  p2   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Sometimes  I  like  to  talk  with  one  of  them, 
and  sometimes  with  the  other.  After  a  while  I 
get  tired  of  both.  When  a  fit  of  intellectual 
disgust  comes  over  me,  I  will  tell  you  what  I 
have  found  admirable  as  a  diversion,  in  addition 
to  boating  and  other  amusements  which  I  have 
spoken  of, — that  is,  working  at  my  carpenter's 
bench.  Some  mechanical  employment  is  the 
greatest  possible  relief,  after  the  purely  intellect- 
ual faculties  begin  to  tire.  When  I  was  quar- 
antined once  at  Marseilles,  I  got  to  work 
immediately  at  carving  a  wooden  wonder  of 
loose  rings  on  a  stick,  and  got  so  interested  in 
it,  that,  when  we  were  set  loose,  I  "regained 
my  freedom  with  a  sigh,"  because  my  toy  was 
unfinished. 

There  are  long  seasons  when  I  talk  only  with 
the  Professor,  and  others  when  I  give  myself 
wholly  up  to  the  Poet.  Now  that  my  winter's 
work  is  over,  and  spring  is  with  us,  I  feel  nat- 
urally drawn  to  the  Poet's  company.  I  don't 
know  anybody  more  alive  to  life  than  he  is. 
The  passion  of  poetry  seizes  on  him  every  spring, 
he  says, — yet  oftentimes  he  complains,  that 
when  he  feels  most,  he  can  sing  least. 

Then  a  fit  of  despondency  comes  over  him. 
— I  feel  ashamed,  sometimes, — said  he,  the  other 
day, — to  think  how  far  my  worst  songs  fall  be- 
low my  best.  It  sometimes  seems  to  me,  as  I 
know  it  does  to  others  who  have  told  me  so, 
that  they  ought  to  be  all  best, — if  not  in  actual 
execution,  at  least  in  plan  and  motive.  I  am 
grateful, — he  continued, — for  all  such  criticisms. 
A  man  is  always  pleased  to  have  his  most  seri- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   193 

ous  efforts  praised,  and  the  highest  aspect  of  his 
nature  get  the  most  sunshine. 

Yet  I  am  sure,  that,  in  the  nature  of  things, 
many  minds  must  change  their  key  now  and  then, 
on  penalty  of  getting  out  of  tune  or  losing  their 
voices.  You  know,  I  suppose, — he  said, — what 
is  meant  by  complimentary  colors?  You  know 
the  effect,  too,  that  the  prolonged  impression  of 
any  one  color  has  on  the  retina.  If  you  close 
your  eyes  after  looking  steadily  at  a  red  object, 
you  see  a  green  image. 

It  is  so  with  many  minds, — I  will  not  say  with 
all.  After  looking  at  one  aspect  of  external  na- 
ture, or  of  any  form  beauty  or  truth,  when 
they  turn  away,  the  complementary  aspect  of 
the  same  object  stamps  itself  irresistibly  and 
automatically  upon  the  mind.  Shall  they  give 
expression  to  their  secondary  mental  state  or 
not? 

When  I  contemplate — said  my  friend,  the 
Poet — the  infinite  largeness  of  comprehension 
belonging  to  the  Central  Intelligence,  how  re- 
mote the  creative  conception  is  from  all  scholas- 
tic and  ethical  formulae,  I  am  led  to  think  that 
a  healthy  mind  ought  to  change  its  mood  from 
time  to  time,  and  come  down  from  its  noblest  con- 
dition,—neverof  course  to  degrade  itself  by  dwell- 
ing upon  what  is  itself  debasing,  but  to  let  its 
lower  faculties  have  a  chance  to  air  and  exercise 
themselves.  After  the  first  and  second  floor 
have  been  out  in  the  bright  street  dressed  in  all 
their  splendors,  shall  not  our  humble  friends  in 
the  basement  have  their  holiday,  and  the  cotton 
velvet  and  the  thin-skinned  jewelry — simple 


194  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

adornments,  but  befitting  the  station  of  those  who 
wear  them — show  themselves  to  the  crowd,  who 
think  them  beautiful,  as  they  ought  to,  though 
the  people  upstairs  know  that  they  are  cheap  and 
perishable? 

I  don't  know  but  that  I  may  bring  the  Poet 
here,  some  day  or  other,  and  let  him  speak  for 
himself.  Still  I  think  I  can  tell  you  what  he 
says  quite  as  well  as  he  could  do  it. — Oh, — he 
said  to  me,  one  day, — I  am  but  a  hand-organ 
man, — say  rather  a  hand-organ.  Life  turns  the 
winch,  and  fancy  or  accident  pulls  out  the  stops. 
I  come  under  your  windows,  some  fine  spring 
morning,  and  play  you  one  of  my  adagio  move- 
ments, and  some  of  you  say, — This  is  good, — 
play  us  so  always. 

But,  dear  friends,  if  I  did  not  change  the 
stop  sometimes,  the  machine  would  wear  out  in 
one  part  and  rust  in  another.  How  easily  this 
or  that  tune  flows! — you  say, — there  must  be  no 
end  of  just  such  melodies  in  him.  I  will  open 
the  poor  machine  for  you  one  moment,  and  you 
shall  look. — Ahl  Every  note  marks  where  a 
spur  of  steel  has  been  driven  in.  It  is  easy  to 
grind  out  the  song,  but  to  plant  these  bristling 
points  which  make  it  was  the  painful  task  of 
time. 

I  don't  like  to  say  it, — he  continued, — but  poets 
commonly  have  no  larger  stock  of  tunes  than 
hand-organs;  and  when  you  hear  them  piping 
up  under  your  window,  you  know  pretty  well 
what  to  expect.  The  more  stops,  the  better. 
Do  let  them  all  be  pulled  out  in  their  turn ! 

So  spoke  my  friend,  the  Poet,  and  read    mo 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST- TABLE   195 

one  of  his  stateliest  songs,  and  after  it  a  gay 
chanson,  and  then  a  string  of  epigrams.  All 
true, — he  said, — all  flowers  of  his  soul;  only  one 
with  the  corolla  spread,  and  another  with  its 
disk  half  opened,  and  the  third  with  the  heart- 
leaves  covered  up  and  only  a  petal  or  two  show- 
ing its  tip  through  the  calyx.  The  water  lily  is 
the  type  of  the  poet's  soul,  he  told  me. 

What  do  you  think,  Sir, — said  the  divinity- 
student, — opens  the  souls  of  poets  most  fully? 

Why,  there  must  be  the  internal  force  and  the 
exteruaLgiimnlns. — Neither  is  enough  by  itself. 
A  rose  will  not  flower  in  the  dark,  and  a  fern 
will  not  flower  anywhere. 

What  do  I  think  is  the  true  sunshine  that  opens 
the  poet's  corolla? — I  don't  like  to  say.  They 
spoil  a  good  many,  I  am  afraid;  or  at  least  they 
shine  on  a  good  many  that  never  come  to  any- 
thing. 

"Who  are  they?"  said  the  schoolmistress. 

Women.  Their  love  first  inspires  the  poet, 
and  their  praise  is  his  best  reward. 

The  schoolmistress  reddened  a  little,  but 
looked  pleased. — Did  I  really  think  so? — I  do 
think  so;  I  never  feel  safe  until  I  have  pleased 
them;  I  don't  think  they  are  the  first  to  see 
one's  defects,  but  they  are  the  first  to  catch  the 
color  and  fragrance  of  a  true  poem.  Fit  the 
same  intellect  to  a  man  and  it  is  a  bow-string, 
— to  a  woman,  and  it  is  a  harp-string.  She  is 
vibratile  and  resonant  all  over,  so  she  stirs  with 
slighter  musical  tremblings  of  the  air  about  her. — 
Ah,  me! — said  my  friend,  the  Poet,  to  me  the 
other  day, — what  color  would  it  have  given  to 


Ip6   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

my  thoughts,  and  what  thrice-washed  whiteness 
to  my  words,  had  I  been  fed  on  women's  praises! 
I  should  have  grown  like  Marvell's  fawn, — 

"Lilies  without ;  roses  within  !" 

But  then, — he  added, — we  all  think  if  so 
and  so,  we  should  have  been  this  or  that,  as  you 
were  saying  the  other  day,  in  those  rhymes  of 
yours. 

I  don't  think  there  are  many  poets  in  the  sense 
of  creators;  but  of  those  sensitive  natures  which 
reflect  themselves  naturally  in  soft  and  melodious 
words,  pleading  for  sympathy  with  their  joys 
and  sorrows,  every  literature  is  full.  Nature 
carves  with  her  own  hands  the  brain  which  holds 
the  creative  imagination,  but  she  casts  the  over- 
sensitive creatures  in  scores  from  the  same 

ould. 

There  are  two  kinds  of  poets,  just  as  there 
are  two  kind  of  blondes.  [Movement  of  curiosity 
among  our  ladies  at  table. — Please  to  tell  us 
about  those  blondes,  said  the  schoolmistress.] 
Why,  there  are  blondes  who  are  such  simply  by 
deficiency  of  coloring  matter, — negative  or 
"washed  blondes,  arrested  by  Nature  on  the  way 
to  become  albinesses.  There  are  others  that 
are  shot  through  with  golden  light,  with  tawny 
or  fulvous  tinges  in  various  degrees, — -positive 
or  stained  blondes,  dipped  in  yellow  sunbeams, 
and  as  unlike  in  their  mode  of  being  to  the  others 
as  an  orange  is  unlike  a  snowball.  The  albino- 
style  carries  with  it  a  wide  pupil  and  a  sensitive 
retina.  The  other,  or  the  leonine  blonde,  has 


r 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   197 

an  opaline  fire  in  her  clear  eye,  which  the  bru- 
nette can  hardly  match  with  her  quick,  glittering 
glances. 

Just  so  we  have  the  great  sun-kindled,  con- 
structive imaginations,  and  a  far  more  numerous 
class  of  poets  who  have  a  certain  kind  of 
moonlight  genius  given  them  to  compensate  for 
their  imperfection  of  nature.  Their  want  of 
mental  coloring  matter  makes  them  sensitive  to 
those  impressions  which  stronger  minds  neglect 
or  never  feel  at  all.  Many  of  them  die  young, 
and  all  of  them  are  tinged  with  melancholy. 
There  is  no  more  beautiful  illustration  of  the 
principle  of  compensation  which  marks  the  Di- 
vine benevolence  than  the  fact  that  some  of  the 
holiest  lives  and  some  of  the  sweetest  songs  are 
the  growth  of  the  infirmity  which  unfits  its  sub- 
ject for  the  rougher  duties  of  life.  When  one 
reads  the  life  of  Cowper,  or  of  Keats,  or  of 
Lucretia  and  Margaret  Davidson, — of  so  many 
gentle,  sweet  natures,  born  to  weakness,  and 
mostly  dying  before  their  time,  one  cannot  help 
thinking  that  the  human  race  dies  out  singing, 
like  the  swan  in  the  old  story.  The  French 
poet,  Gilbert,  who  died  at  the  Hotel  Dieu,  at 
the  age  of  twenty-nine, — (killed  by  a  key  in  his 
throat,  which  he  had  swallowed  when  delirious 
in  consequence  of  a  fall),  this  poor  fellow  was 
a  very  good  example  of  the  poet  by  excess  of 
sensibility.  I  found,  the  other  day,  that  some 
of  my  literary  friends  had  never  heard  of  him, 
though  I  suppose  few  educated  Frenchmen  do 
not  know  the  lines  which  he  wrote,  a  week  be- 
fore his  death,  upon  a  mean  bed  in  the  great 
hospital  at  Paris. 


198  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST- TABLE 

"Au  banquet  de  la  vie,  infortune"  convive, 

J'apparus  un  jour,  et  je  meurs  ; 
Je  meurs,  et  sur  ma  tombe,  oil  lentement  j'arrive- 
Nul  ne  viendra  verser  des  pleurs." 

"At  life's  gay  banquet  placed,  a  poor  unhappy  guest, 

One  day  I  pass,  then  disappear  ; 
I  die,  and  on  the  tomb  where  I  at  length  shall  rest 
No  friend  shall  come  to  shed  a  tear." 

You  remember  the  same  thing  in  other  words 
somewhere  in  Kirke  White's  poems.  It  is  the 
burden  of  the  plaintive  songs  of  all  these  sweet 
albino-poets.  "I  shall  die  and  be  forgotten  and 
the  world  will  go  on  just  as  if  I  had  never  been; 
— and  yet  how  I  have  loved!  How  I  have 
longed!  How  I  have  aspired!"  And  so  singing, 
their  eyes  grow  brighter  and  brighter,  and  their 
features  thinner  and  thinner,  until  at  last  the  veil 
of  flesh  is  threadbare,  and,  still  singing,  they 
drop  it  and  pass  onward. 

Our  brains  are  seventy-year  clocks.  The 
Angel  of  Life  winds  them  up  once  for  all,  then 
closes  the  case,  and  gives  the  key  into  the  hand 
of  the  Angel  of  the  Resurrection. 

Tic-tac!  tic-tac!  go  the  wheels  of  thought; 
our  will  cannot  stop  them ;  they  cannot  stop 
themselves;  sleep  cannot  still  them;  madness 
only  makes  them  go  faster;  death  alone  can 
break  into  the  case,  and,  seizing  the  ever-swing- 
ing pendulum,  which  we  call  the  heart,  silence 
at  last  the  clicking  of  the  terrible  escapement 
we  have  carried  so  long  beneath  our  wrinkled 
foreheads. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 


I99 


If  we  could  only  get  at  them,  as  we  lie  on  our 
pillows  and  count  the  dead  beats  of  thought  after 
thought  and  image  after  image  jarring  through 
the  over-tired  organ !  Will  nobody  block  these 
wheels,  uncouple  that  pinion,  cut  the  string  that 
holds  those  weights, blow  up  the  infernal  machine 
with  gunpowder?  What  a  passion  comes  over 
us  sometimes  for  silence  and  rest! — that  this 
dreadful  mechanism,  unwinding  the  endless 
tapestry  of  time,  embroidered  with  spectral  fig- 
ures of  life  and  death,  could  have  but  one  brief 
holiday!  Who  can  wonder  that  men  swing 
themselves  off  from  beams  in  hempen  lassos? — 
that  they  jump  off  from  parapets  into  the"  swift 
and  gurgling  waters  beneath? — that  they  take 
counsel  of  the  grim  friend  who  has  but  to  utter 
his  one  peremptory  monosyllable  and  the  rest- 
less machine  is  shivered  as  a  vase  that  is  dashed 
upon  a  marble  floor?  Under  that  building  which 
we  pass  every  day  there  are  strong  dungeons, 
where  neither  hook,  nor  bar,  nor  bed-cord,  nor 
drinking-vessel  from  which  a  sharp  fragment 
may  be  shattered,  shall  by  any  chance  be  seen. 
There  is  nothing  for  it,  when  the  brain  is  on 
fire  with  the  whirling  of  its  wheels,  but  to  spring 
against  the  stone  wall  and  silence  them  with  one 
crash.  Ah,  they  remembered  that, — the  kind 
city  fathers, — and  the  walls  are  nicely  padded, 
so  that  one  can  take  such  exercise  as  he  likes 
without  damaging  himself  on  the  very  plain  and 
serviceable  upholstery.  If  anybody  would  only 
contrive  some  kind  of  a  lever  that  one  could 
thrust  in  among  the  works  of  this  horrid  autom- 
aton and  check  them,  or  alter  their,  rate  of 


2OO  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

going,  what  would  the  world  give  for  the  dis- 
covery ? 

From  half  a  dime  to  a  dime,  according  to  the 
style  of  the  place  and  the  quality  of  the  liquor, — 
said  the  young  fellow  whom  they  call  John. 

You  speak  trivially,  but  not  unwisely,  I  said. 
Unless  the  will  maintain  a  certain  control  over 
these  movements,  which  it  cannot  stop,  but  can 
to  some  extent  regulate,  men  are  very  apt  to  try 
to  get  at  the  machine  by  some  indirect  system 
of  leverage  or  other.  They  clap  on  the  brakes 
by  means  of  opium ;  they  change  the  madden- 
ing monotony  of  the  rhythm  by  means  of  fer- 
mented liquors.  It  is  because  the  brain  is  locked 
up  and  we  cannot  touch  its  movement  directly, 
that  we  thrust  these  coarse  tools  in  through  any 
crevice  by  which  they  may  reach  the  interior, 
and  so  alter  its  rate  of  going  for  a  while,  and  at 
last  spoil  the  machine. 

Men  who  exercise  chiefly  those  faculties  of 
the  mind  which  work  independently  of  the  will, 
poets  and  artists,  for  instance,  who  follow  their 
imagination  in  the  creative  movements,  instead 
of  keeping  it  in  hand  as  your  logicians  and  prac- 
tical men  do  with  their  reasoning  faculty — such 
men  are  apt  to  call  in  the  mechanical  appliances 
to  help  them  govern  their  intellects. 

He  means  they  get  drunk — said  the  young  fel- 
low already  alluded  to  by  name. 

Do  you  think  men  of  true  genius  are  apt  to 
indulge  in  the  use  of  inebriating  fluids?  said  the 
divinity-student. 

If  you  think  you  are  strong  enough  to  bear 
what  I  am  going  to  say, — I  replied, — I  will  talk 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2OI 

to  you  aoout  this.  But  mind,  now,  these  are 
the  things  that  some  foolish  people  call  danger- 
ous subjects, — as  if  these  vices  which  burrow 
into  people's  souls,  as  the  Guinea-worm  burrows 
into  the  naked  feet  of  West  Indian  slaves,  would 
be  more  mischievous  when  seen  than  out  of 
sight.  Now  the  true  way  to  deal  with  these  ob- 
stinate animals,  which  are  a  dozen  feet  long, 
some  of  them,  and  no  bigger  than  a  horse-hair, 
is  to  get  a  piece  of  silk  around  their  heads, 
and  pull  them  out  very  cautiously.  If  you  only 
break  them  off,  they  grow  worse  than  ever,  and 
sometimes  kill  the  person  that  has  the  misfortune 
to  harbor  one  of  them.  Whence  it  is  plain  that 
the  first  thing  to  do  is  to  find  where  the  head 
lies. 

Just  so  of  all  the  vices,  and  particularly  of 
this  vice  of  intemperance.  What  is  the  head  of 
it,  and  where  does  it  lie?  For  you  may  depend 
upon  it,  there  is  not  one  of  these  vices  that  has 
not  a  head  of  its  own, — an  intelligence, — a  mean- 
ing,— a  certain  virtue,  I  was  going  to  say, — but 
that  might,  perhaps,  sound  paradoxical.  I  have 
heard  an  immense  number  of  moral  physicians 
lay  down  the  treatment  of  moral  Guinea-worms, 
and  the  vast  majority  of  them  would  always  in- 
sist that  the  creature  had  no  head  at  all,  but  was 
all  body  and  tail.  So  I  have  found  a  very  com- 
mon result  of  their  method  to  be  that  the  string 
slipped,  or  that  a  piece  only  of  the  creature  was 
broken  off,  and  the  worm  soon  grew  again,  as 
bad  as  ever.  The  truth  is,  if  the  Devil  could 
only  appear  in  church  by  attorney,  and  make 
the  best  statement  that  the  facts  would  bear  him 


202   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

out  in  doing  on  behalf  of  his  special  virtues 
(what  we  commonly  call  vices),  the  influence 
of  good  teachers  would  be  much  greater  than  it- 
is.  For  the  arguments  by  which  the  Devil  pre- 
vails are  precisely  the  ones  that  the  Devil-queller 
most  rarely  answers.  The  way  to  argue  down 
a  vice  is  not  to  tell  lies  about  it, — to  say  that  it 
has  no  attractions,  when  everybody  knows  that 
it  has, — but  rather  to  let  it  make  out  its  case  just 
as  it  certainly  will  in  the  moment  of  temptation, 
and  then  meet  it  with  the  weapons  furnished  by 
the  Divine  armory.  Ithuriel  did  not  spit  the 
toad  on  his  spear,  you  remember,  but  touched 
him  with  it,  and  the  blasted  angel  took  the  sad 
glories  of  his  true  shape.  If  he  had  shown  fight 
then,  the  fair  spirits  would  have  known  how  to 
deal  with  him. 

That  all  spasmodic  cerebral  action  is  an  evil 
is  not  perfectly  clear.  Men  get  fairly  intoxi- 
cated with  music,  with  poetry,  with  religious 
excitement, — oftenest  with  love.  Ninon  de 
1'Enclos  said  she  was  so  easily  excited  that  her 
soup  intoxicated  her,  and  convalescents  have 
been  made  tipsy  by  a  beefsteak. 

There  are  forms  and  stages  of  alcoholic  exal- 
tation which,  in  themselves,  and  without  regard 
to  their  consequences,  might  be  considered  as 
positive  improvements  of  the  persons  affected. 
When  the  sluggish  intellect  is  roused,  the  slow 
speech  quickened,  the  cold  nature  warmed,  the 
latent  sympathy  developed,  the  flagging  spirit 
kindled, — before  the  trains  of  thought  become 
confused,  or  the  will  perverted,  or  the  muscles 
relaxed, — just  at  the  moment  when  the  whole 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2O3 

human  zoophyte  flowers  out  like  a  full-blown 
rose,  and  is  ripe  for  the  subscription-paper  or 
the  contribution-box, — it  would  be  hard  to  say 
that  a  man  was,  at  that  very  time,  worse,  or 
less  to  be  loved,  than  when  driving  a  hard  bar- 
gain with  all  his  meaner  wits  about  him.  The 
difficulty  is,  that  the  alcoholic  virtues  don't 
wash ;  but  until  the  water  takes  their  colors  out, 
the  tints  are  very  much  like  those  of  the  true 
celestial  stuff. 

[Here  I  was  interrupted  by  a  question  which 
I  am  very  unwilling  to  report,  but  have  confi- 
dence enough  in  those  friends  who  examine 
these  records  to  commit  to  their  candor. 

A  person  at  table  asked  me  whether  I  "  went  in 
for  rum  as  a  steady  drink.'' — His  manner  made 
the  question  highly  offensive,  but  I  restrained 
myself  and  answered  thus: — ] 

Rum  I  take  to  be  the  name  which  unwashed 
moralists  apply  alike  to  the  product  distilled  from 
molasses  and  the  noblest  juices  of  the  vineyard. 
Burgundy  "in  all  its  sunset  glow"  is  rum. 
Champagne,  "the  foaming  wine  of  Eastern 
France,"  is  rum.  Hock,  which  our  friend,  the 
Poet,  speaks  of  as 

"The  Rhine's  breast-milk,  gushing  cold  and  bright 
Pale  as  the  moon  and  maddening  as  her  light," 

is  rum.  Sir,  I  repudiate  the  loathsome  vulgar- 
ism as  an  insult  to  the  first  miracle  wrought  by 
the  Founder  of  our  religion!  I  address  myself 
to  the  company. — I  believe  in  temperance,  nay, 
almost  in  abstinence, as  a  rule  for  healthy  people. 
I  trust  that  I  practice  both.  But  let  me  tell  you, 


2O4  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

there  are  companies  of  men  of  genius  into  which 
I  sometimes  go,  where  the  atmosphere  of  intel- 
lect and  sentiment  is  so  much  more  stimulating 
than  alcohol,  that,  if  I  thought  fit  to  take  wine, 
it  would  be  to  keep  me  sober. 

Among  the  gentlemen  that  I  have  known,  few, 
if  any,  were  ruined  by  drinking.  My  few  drunk- 
en acquaintances  were  generally  ruined  before 
they  became  drunkards.  The  habit  of  drinking 
is  often  a  vice,  no  doubt, — sometimes  a  misfor- 
tune,— as  when  an  almost  irresistible  hereditary 
propensity  exists  to  indulge  in  it, — but  oftenest 
of  all  a  -punishment. 

Empty  heads, — heads  without  ideas  in  whole- 
some variety  and  sufficient  number  to  furnish 
food  for  the  mental  clockwork, — ill-regulated 
heads,  where  the  faculties  are  not  under  the  con- 
trol of  the  will, — these  are  the  ones  that  hold  the 
brains  which  their  owners  are  so  apt  to  tamper 
with,  by  introducing  the  appliances  we  have  been 
talking  about.  Now,  when  a  gentleman's  brain 
is  empty  or  ill-regulated,  it  is,  to  a  great  extent, 
his  own  fault;  and  so  it  is  simple  retribution, 
that,  while  he  lies  slothfully  sleeping  or  aim- 
lessly dreaming,  the  fatal  habit  settles  on  him 
like  a  vampire,  and  sucks  his  blood,  fanning  him 
all  the  while  with  its  hot  wings  into  deeper  slum- 
ber or  idler  dreams!  I  am  not  such  a  hard- 
souled  being  as  to  apply  this  to  the  neglected 
poor,  who  have  had  no  chance  to  fill  their  heads 
with  wholesome  ideas,  and  to  be  taught  the  les- 
son of  self-government.  I  trust  the  tariff  of 
Heaven  has  no  ad  valor  em  scale  for  them, — and 
all  of  us. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2O5 

But  to  come  back  to  poets  and  artists ; — if  they 
really  are  more  prone  to  the  abuse  of  stimulants, 
— and  I  fear  that  this  is  true, — the  reason  of  it  is 
only  too  clear.  A  man  abandons  himself  to  fine 
frenzy,  and  the  power  which  flows  through  him, 
as  I  once  explained  to  you,  makes  him  the  me- 
dium of  a  great  poem  or  a  great  picture.  The 
creative  action  is  not  voluntary  at  all, but  auto- 
matic; we  can  only  put  the  mind  into  the  proper 
attitude,  and  wait  for  the  wind,  that  blows  where 
it  listeth,  to  breathe  over  it.  Thus  the  true  state 
of  creative  genius  is  allied  to  reverie,  or  dream- 
ing. If  mind  and  body  were  both  healthy,  and 
had  food  enough  and  fair  play, I  doubt  whether 
any  men  would  be  more  temperate  than  the 
imaginative  classes.  But  body  and  mind  often 
flag, — perhaps  they  are  ill-made  to  begin  with, 
underfed  with  bread  or  ideas,  ovei worked,  or 
abused  in  some  way.  The  automatic  action,  by 
which  genius  wrought  its  wonders,  fails.  There 
is  only  one  thing  which  can  rouse  the  machine; 
not  will, — that  cannot  reach  it;  nothing  but  a 
ruinous  agent,  which  hurries  the  wheels  awhile 
and  soon  eats  out  the  heart  of  the  mechanism. 
The  dreaming  faculties  are  always  the  dangerous 
ones,  because  their  mode  of  action  can  be  imi- 
tated t)y  artificial  excitement;  the  reasoning 
ones  are  safe,  because  they  imply  continued  vol- 
untary effort. 

T  think,  y  on  will  find  it  true,  that,  before  any 
vice  can  fasten  on  a  man,  body,  mind,  or  moral 
.nature  must  be  debilitated.  The  mosses  and 
fungi  gather  on  sickly  trees,  not  thriving  ones; 
and  the  odious  parasites  which  fasten  on  the 


2O6  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

human  frame  choose  that  which  is  already  en- 
feebled. Mr.  Walker,  the  hygeian  humorist, 
declared  that  he  had  such  a  healthy  skin  it  was 
impossible  for  any  impurity  to  stick  to  it,  and  it 
was  an  absurdity  to  wash  a  face  which  was  of 
necessity  always  clean.  I  don't  know  how  much 
fancy  there  was  in  this;  but  there  is  no  fancy  in 
saying  that  the  lassitude  of  tired-out  operatives, 
and  the  languor  of  imaginative  natures  in  their 
periods  of  collapse,  and  the  vacuity  of  minds 
untrained  to  labor  and  discipline,  fit  the  soul  and 
body  for  the  germination  of  the  seeds  of  intem- 
perance. 

Whenever  the  wandering  demon  of  Drunken- 
ness finds  a  ship  adrift, — no  steady  wind  in  its 
sails,  no  thoughtful  pilot  directing  its  course,  he 
steps  on  board,takes  the  helm, and  steers  straight 
for  the  maelstrom. 

I  wonder  if  you  know  the  terrible  smile? 
[The  young  fellow  whom  they  call  John  winked 
very  hard,  and  made  a  jocular  remark,  the  sense 
of  which  seemed  to  depend  on  some  double 
meaning  of  the  word  smile.  The  company  was 
curious  to  know  what  I  meant.] 

There  are  persons — I  said — who  no  sooner 
come  within  sight  of  you  than  they  begin  to 
smile,  with  an  uncertain  movement  of  the  mouth, 
which  conveys  the  idea  that  they  are  thinking 
about  themselves, — and  thinking,  too,  that  you 
are  thinking  they  are  thinking  about  themselves, 
— and  so  look  at  you  with  a  wretched  mixture 
of  self-consciousness, awkwardness,  and  attempts 
to  carry  off  both,  which  are  betrayed  by  the 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2OJ 

cowardly  behavior  of  the  eye  and  the  tell-tale 
weakness  of  the  lips  that  characterize  these  un- 
fortunate beings. 

Why  do  you  call  them  unfortunate,  Sir?  — 
asked  the  divinity  student. 

Because  it  is  evident  that  the  consciousness  of 
some  imbecility  or  other  is  at  the  bottom  of  this 
extraordinary  expression.  I  don't  think,  how- 
ever, that  these  persons  are  commonly  fools.  I 
have  known  a  number,  and  all  of  them  were  in- 
telligent. I  thir|lc  nothing  ^Qnypys  ffro  ^<^  »* 
under  breeding  more  than  this  self-betray i n g 
jamTTf ,  ^-Y  pt-  i  think  this  peculiar  had  I,  as  WeH- 
as  that  of  meaningless  blushing,  may  be  fallen 
into  by  very  good  people  who  meet  often  or  sit 
opposite  each  other  at  table.  A  true  gentleman's 
face  its  infinitely  removed  from  all  such  paltri- 
ness,— calm  eyed, firm-mouthed.  I  think  Titian 
understood  the  look  of  a  gentleman  as  well  as 
anybody  that  ever  lived.  The  portrait  of  a  young 
man  holding  a  glove  in  his  hand,  in  the  Gallery 
of  the  Louvre,  if  any  of  you  have  seen  that 
collection,  will  remind  you  of  what  I  mean. 

— Do  I  think  these  people  know  the  peculiar 
look  they  have? — I  cannot  say;  I  hope  not;  I 
am  afraid  they  would  never  forgive  me,  if  they 
did.  The  worst  of  it  is,  the  trick  is  catching; 
when  one  meets  one  of  these  fellows  he  feels  a 
tendency  to  the  same  manifestation.  The  Pro- 
fessor tells  me  there  is  a  muscular  slip,a  depend- 
ence of  the  platysma  myoides,  which  is  called 
the  risorius  Santorini. 

— Say  that  once  more, — exclaimed  the  young 
fellow  mentioned  above. 


2O8   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

The  Professor  says  there  is  a  little  fleshy  slip 
called  Santorini's  laughing-muscle.  I  would 
have  it  cut  out  of  my  face  if  I  were  born  with 
one  of  those  constitutional  grins  upon  it.  Per- 
haps I  am  uncharitable  in  my  judgment  of  those 
sour-looking  people  I  told  you  of  the  other  day, 
and  of  these  smiling  folks.  It  may  be  that  they 
are  born  with  these  looks  as  other  people  are 
with  more  generally  recognized  deformities. 
Both  are  bad  enough, but  I  had  rather  meet  three 
of  the  scowlers  than  one  of  the  smilers. 

There  is  another  unfortunate  way  of  looking, 
which  is  peculiar  to  that  amiable  sex  we  do  not 
like  to  find  fault  with.  There  are  some  very 
pretty,  but,  unhappily,  very  ill-bred  women, 
who  don't  understand  the  law  of  the  road  with 
regard  to  handsome  faces.  Nature  and  custom 
would,  no  doubt,  agree  in  conceding  to  all  males 
the  right  of  at  least  two  distinct  looks  at  every 
comely  female  countenance,  without  any  infrac- 
tion of  the  rules  of  courtesy  or  the  sentiment  of 
respect.  The  first  look  is  necessary  to  define 
the  person  of  the  individual  one  meets  so  as  to 
recognize  an  acquaintance.  Any  unusual  attrac- 
tion detected  in  a  first  glance  is  a  sufficient  apology 
for  a  second, — not  a  prolonged  and  impertinent 
stare,  but  an  appreciating  homage  of  the  eyes, 
such  as  a  stranger  may  inoffensively  yield  to  a 
passing  image.  It  is  astonishing  how  morbidly 
sensitive  some  vulgar  beauties  are  to  the  slightest 
demonstration  of  this  kind.  When  a  lady  walks 
the  streets,  she  leaves  her  virtuous-indignation 
countenance  at  home;  she  knows  well  enough 
that  the  street  is  a  picture-gallery,  where  pretty 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2Op 

faces  framed  in  pretty  bonnets  are  meant  to  be 
seen,  and  everybody  has  a  right  to  see  them. 

When  we  observe  how  the  same  features  and 
style  of  person  and  character  descend  from  gen- 
eration to  generation,  we  can  believe  that  some 
inherited  weakness  may  account  for  these  pecu- 
liarities. Little  snapping-turtles  snap — so  the 
great  naturalists  tells  us — before  they  are  out  of 
the  egg-shell.  I  am  satisfied,  that,  much  higher 
up  in  the  scale  of  life,  character  is  distinctly 
shown  at  the  age  of — 2  or — 3  months. 

My  friend,  the  Professor,  has  been  full  of 
eggs  lately.  [This  remark  excited  a  burst  of 
hilarity,  which  I  did  not  allow  to  interrupt  the 
course  of  my  observations.]  He  has  been  read- 
ing the  great  book  where  he  found  the  fact  about 
the  little  snapping-turtles  mentioned  above. 
Some  of  the  things  he  has  told  me  have  sug- 
gested several  odd  analogies  enough. 

There  are  half  a  dozen  men,  or  so,  who  carry 
in  their  brains  the  ovarian  eggs  of  the  next  gene- 
ration's or  century's  civilization.  These  eggs 
are  not  ready  to  be  laid  in  the  form  of  books 
as  yet;  some  of  them  are  hardly  ready  to  be  put 
into  the  form  of  talk.  But  as  rudimentary  ideas 
or  inchoate  tendencies,  there  they  are;  and 
these  are  what  must  form  the  future.  A  man's 
general  notions  are  not  good  for  much, unless  he 
has  a  crop  of  these  intellectual  ovarian  eggs  in 
his  own  brain,  or  knows  them  as  they  exist  in 
the  minds  of  others.  One  must  be  in  the  habit 
of  talking  with  such  persons  to  get  at  these  ru- 
dimentary germs  of  thought;  for  their  develop- 
ment is  necessarily  imperfect,  and  they  are 


2IO   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

molded  on  new  patterns,  which  must  be  long 
and  closely  studied.  But  these  are  the  men  to 
talk  with.  No  fresh  truth  ever  gets  into  a  book. 

A  good  many  fresh  lies  get  in,  anyhow, — said 
one  of  the  company. 

I  proceeded  in  spite  of  the  interruption. 
All  uttered  thought,  my  friend,  the  Professor, 
says,  is  of  the  nature  of  an  excretion.  Its  ma- 
terials have  been  taken  in,  and  have  acted  upon 
the  system,  and  been  reacted  on  by  it;  it  has 
circulated  and  done  its  office  in  one  mind  before 
it  is  given  out  for  the  benefit  of  others.  It  may 
be  milk  or  venom  to  other  minds;  but,  in  either 
case,  it  is  something  which  the  producer  has 
had  the  use  of  and  can  part  with.  A  man  in- 
stinctively tries  to  get  rid  of  his  thought  in  con- 
versation or  in  print  so  soon  as  it  is  matured; 
but  it  is  hard  to  get  at  it  as  it  lies  imbedded,  a 
mere  potentiality,  the  germ  of  a  germ,  in  his 
intellect. 

Where  are  the  brains  that  are  fullest  of  these 
ovarian  eggs  of  thought? — I  decline  mentioning 
individuals.  The  producers  of  thought,  who  are 
few,  the  "jobbers1'  of  thought,  who  are  man}', 
and  the  retailers  of  thought,  who  are  number- 
less, are  so  mixed  up  in  the  popular  apprehen- 
sion, that  it  would  be  hopeless  to  try  to  separate 
them  before  opinion  has  had  time  to  settle.  Fol- 
low the  course  of  opinion  on  the  great  subjects 
of  human  interest  for  a  few  generations  or  cen- 
turies, get  its  parallax,  map  out  a  small  arc  of 
its  movement,  see  where  it  tends,  and  then  see 
who  is  in  advance  of  it  or  even  with  it ;  the  world 
calls  him  hard  names,  probably, but  if  you  would 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2 1 1 

find  the  ova  of  the  future,  you  must  look  into 
the  folds  of  his  cerebral  convolutions. 

[The  divinity-student  looked  a  little  puzzled 
at  this  suggestion,  as  if  he  did  not  see  exactly 
where  he  was  to  come  out,  if  he  computed  his 
arc  too  nicely.  I  think  it  possible  it  might  cut 
off  a  few  corners  of  his  present  belief,  as  it  has 
cut  off  martyr- burning  and  witch-hanging; — 
but  time  will  show, — time  will  show,  as  the  old 
gentleman  opposite  says.  J 

Oh, — here  is  that  copy  of  verses  I  told 
you  about. 

SPRING  HAS  COME. 
Intra  Muros. 

The  sunbeams,  lost  for  half  a  year, 

Slant  through  my  pane  their  morning  rays; 

For  dry  Northwesters  cold  and  clear, 
The  East  blows  in  its  thin  blue  haze. 

And  first  the  snowdrop's  bells  are  seen, 
Then  close  against  the  sheltering  wall 
The  tulip's  horn  of  dusky  green. 
The  peony's  dark  unfolding  ball; 

The  golden-chaliced  crocus  burns; 

The  long  narcissus-blades  appear; 
The  cone-beaked  hyacinth  returns, 

And  lights  her  blue-flamed  chandelier. 

The  willow's  whistling  lashes,  wrung 

By  the  wild  wind  of  gusty  March, 
With  sallow  leaflets  lightly  strung, 

Are  swaying  by  the  tufted  larch. 

The  elms  have  robed  their  slender  spray 
With  full-blown  flower  and  embryo  leaf; 


212   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Wide  o'er  the  clasping  arch  of  day 
Soars  like  a  cloud  their  hoary  chief. 

[See  the  proud  tulip's  flauntiug  cup, 

That  flames  in  glory  for  an  hour, — 
Behold  it  withering, — then  look  up, — 

How  meek  the  forest-monarch's  flower! — 

When  wake  the  violets,  Winter  dies; 

When  sprout  the  elm-buds,  Spring  is  near; 
When  lilacs  blossom,  Summer  cries, 

"Bud,  little  roses!  Spring  is  here!"] 

The  windows  blush  with  fresh  bouquets, 

Cut  with  the  May-dew  on  their  lips; 
The  radish  all  its  bloom  displays, 

Pink  as  Aurora's  finger-tips. 

Nor  less  the  flood  of  light  that  showers 

On  beauty's  changed  corolla -shades, — 
The  walks  are  gay  as  bridal  bowers 

With  rows  of  many-petaled  maids. 

The  scarlet  shell-fish  click  and  clash 

In  the  blue  barrow  where  they  slide; 
The  horseman,  proud  of  streak  and  splash, 
Creeps  homeward  from  his  morning  ride. 

Here  comes  the  dealer's  awkward  string, 

With  neck  in  rope  and  tail  in  knot, — 
Rough  colts,  with  careless  country-swing, 

In  lazy  walk  or  slouching  trot. 

Wild  filly  from  the  mountain-side, 

Doomed  to  the  close  and  chafing  thills, 

Lend  me  thy  long,  untiring  stride 
To  seek  with  thee  thy  western  hills. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   213 

I  hear  the  whispering  voice  of  Spring, 

The  thrush's  trill,  the  cat-bird's  cry, 
Like  some  poor  bird  with  prisoned  wing 

That  sits  and  sings,  but  longs  to  fly. 

Oh  for  one  spot  of  living  green, — 

One  little  spot  where  leaves  can  grow, — 

To  love  unblamed,   to  walk  unseen, 
To  dream  above,  to  sleep  below! 


IX. 

[Agm  esta  encerrada  el  alma  del  licenctado 
Pedro  Gar  das. 

If  I  should  ever  make  a  little  book  out  of  these 
papers,  which  I  hope  you  are  not  getting  tired 
of,  I  suppose  I  ought  to  save  the  above  sentence 
for  a  motto  on  the  title-page.  But  I  want  it  now 
and  must  use  it.  I  need  not  say  to  you  that  the 
words  are  Spanish,  nor  that  they  are  to  be  found 
in  the  short  introduction  to  "Gil  Bias,"  nor  that 
they  mean,  "Here  lies  buried  the  soul  of  the 
licentiate  Pedro  Garcias." 

I  warned  all  young  people  off  the  premises 
when  I  began  my  notes  referring  to  old  age.  I 
must  be  equally  fair  with  old  people  now.  They 
are  earnestly  requested  to  leave  this  paper  to 
young  persons  from  the  age  of  twelve  to  that  of 
four-score  years  and  ten,  at  which  latter  period 
of  life  I  am  sure  that  I  shall  have  at  least  one 
youthful  reader.  You  know  well  enough  what 
I  mean  by  youth  and  age; — sfnmpfripg  in  tVip 
soul,  which  has  no  more  *y  Hn  with  thg  roW  nf 


214  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

the  hair  than  the  vein  of  gold  in  a  rock  has  to 
do  with  the  grass  a  thousand  feet  above  it. 

I  am  growing  bolder  as  I  write.  I  think  it 
requires  not  only  youth,  but  genius,  to  read  this 
paper.  I  don't  mean  to  imply  that  it  required 
any  whatsoever  to  talk  what  I  have  here  written 
down.  It  did  demand  a  certain  amount  of  mem- 
ory, and  such  command  of  the  English  tongue 
as  is  given  by  a  common  school  education.  So 
much  I  do  claim.  But  here  I  have  related,  at 
length,  a  string  of  trivialities.  You  must  have 
the  imagination  of  a  poet  to  transfigure  them. 
These  little  colored  patches  are  stains  upon  the 
windows  of  a  human  soul;  stand  on  the  outside, 
they  are  but  dull  and  meaningless  spots  of  color; 
\/seen  from  within,  they  are  glorified  shapes  with 
empurpled  wings  and  sun-bright  aureoles. 

My  hand  trembles  when  I  offer  you  this. 
Many  times  I  have  come  bearing  flowers  such 
as  my  garden  grew;  but  now  I  offer  you  this 
poor,  brown,  homely  growth,  you  ma}"  cast  it 
away  as  worthless.  And  yet  —  and  yet  —  it  is 
something  better  than  flowers  ;it  is  a  seed-capsule. 
Many  a  gardener  will  cut  you  a  bouquet  of  his 
choicest  blossoms  for  small  fee,  but  he  does  not 
love  to  let  the  seeds  of  his  rarest  varieties  go 
out  of  his  own  hands. 

It  is  by  little  things  that  we  know  ourselves; 
a  snnl  wrmlfV  yf>r?  probably  mistake  itself  for 


ajjiother^whep  once  disembodied,  were  it  not  for 
individual  experiences  that  differed  from  those 
oF^thers  only  in  details  seemingly  trifling.  All 
of  us  have  been  thirsty  thousands  of  times,  and 
felt,  with  Pindar,  that  water  was  the  best  of 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   215 

things.  I  alone,  as  I  think,  of  all  mankind, 
remember  one  particular  pailful  of  water,  fla- 
vored with  the  white-pine  of  which  the  pail  was 
made,  and  the  brown  mug  out  of  which  one 
Edmund,  a  red-faced  and  curly-haired  boy, 
was  averred  to  have  bitten  a  fragment  in  his 
haste  to  drink;  it  being  then  high  summer,  and 
little  full-blooded  bo}-s  feeling  very  warm  and 
porous  in  the  low  "studded"  school-room  where 
Dame  Prentiss,  dead  and  gone,  ruled  over  young 
children,  many  of  whom  are  old  ghosts  now, 
and  have  known  Abraham  for  twenty  or  thirty 
years  of  our  mortal  time. 

Thirst  belongs  to  humanity,  everywhere,  in 
all  ages;  but  that  white-pine  pail  and  that  brown 
mug  belong  to  me  in  particular;  and  just  so  of 
my  special  relationships  with  other  things  and 
with  my  race.  One  could  never  remember  him- 
self in  eternity  by  the  mere  fact  of  having  loved 
or  hated  any  more  than  by  that  of  having  thirsted ; 
love  and  ha.tf  haw  nn  flpnrp  individuality  in 
them  th?rn_single  waves  in  the  ocean :  buEZZE 
accidents  or  trivial  marks  which  distinguished 
those  whom  we  loved  or  hated  make  their  mem- 
ory our  own  forever,  and  with  it  that  of  our  own 
personality  also. 

Therefore,  my  aged  friend  of  five-and-twenty, 
or  thereabouts,  pause  at  the  threshold  of  this 
particular  record,  and  ask  yourself  seriously 
whether  you  are  fit  to  read  such  revelations  as 
are  to  follow.  For  observe,  you  have  here  no 
splendid  array  of  petals  such  as  poets  offer  you, 
— nothing  but  a  dry  shell,  containing, if  you  will 
get  out  what  is  in  it,  a  few  small  seeds  of  poems. 


2l6   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

You  may  laugh  at  them,  if  you  like.  I  shall 
never  tell  you  what  I  think  of  you  for  so  doing. 
But  if  you  can  read  into  the  heart  of  these  things 
in  the  light  of  other  memories  as  slight,  yet  as 
dear  to  your  soul,  then  you  are  neither  more  nor 
less  than  a  POET,  and  can  afford  to  write  no 
more  verses  during  the  rest  of  your  natural  life, 
— which  abstinence  I  take  to  be  one  of  the  sur- 
est marks  of  your  meriting  the  divine  name  I 
have  just  bestowed  upon  you. 

May  I  beg  of  you  who  have  begun  this  paper 
nobly  trusting  to  your  own  imagination  and  sen- 
sibilities to  give  it  the  significance  which  it  does 
not  lay  claim  to  without  your  kind  assistance, 
— may  I  beg  of  you,  I  say,  to  pay  particular  at- 
tention to  the  brackets  which  enclose  certain 
paragraphs?  I  want  my  "asides,"  you  see,  to 
whisper  loud  to  you  who  read  my  notes,  and 
sometimes  I  talk  a  page  or  two  to  you  without 
pretending  that  I  said  a  word  of  it  to  our  board- 
ers. You  will  find  a  very  long  "aside"  to  you 
almost  as  soon  as  you  begin  to  read.  And  so, 
dear  young  friend,  fall  to  at  once,  taking  such 
things  as  I  have  provided  for  you;  and  if  you 
turn  them,  by  the  aid  of  your  powerful  imagina- 
tion, into  a  fair  banquet,  why,  then,  peace  be 
with  you,  and  a  summer  by  the  still  waters  of 
some  quiet  river,  or  by  some  yellow  beach, 
where,  as  my  friend,  the  Professor,  says,  you 
can  sit  with  Nature's  wrist  in  your  hand  and 
count  her  ocean-pulses.] 

I  should  like  to  make  a  few  intimate  revela- 
tions relating  especially  to  my  early  life,  if  I 
thought  you  would  like  to  hear  them. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2iy 

[The  schoolmistress  turned  a  little  in  her 
chair,  and  sat  with  her  face  directed  partly  to- 
ward me.  Half-mourning  now ; — purple  ribbon. 
That  breastpin  she  wears  has  gray  hair  in  it; 
her  mother's,  no  doubt; — I  remember  our  land- 
lady's  daughter  telling  me,  soon  after  the  school- 
mistress came  to  board  with  us,  that  she  had 
lately  "buried  a  pay  rent."  That's  what  made 
her  look  so  pale, — kept  the  poor  sick  thing  alive 
with  her  own  blood.  Ah!  long  illness  is  the 
real  vampyrism ;  think  of  living  a  year  or  two 
after  one  is  dead,  by  sucking  the  life-blood  out 
of  a  frail  young  creature  at  one's  bedside!  Well, 
souls  grow  white,  as  well  as  cheeks,  in  these 
holy  duties;  one  that  goes  in  a  nurse  ma}7  come 
out  an  angel.  God  bless  all  good  women! — 
to  their  soft  hands  and  pitying  hearts  we  must  all 
come  at  last!  The  schoolmistress  has  a  better 
color  than  when  she  came. — Too  late! — "It 
might  have  been."  Amen! 

How  many  thoughts  go  to  a  dozen  heart- 
beats, sometimes!  There  was  no  long  pause 
after  my  remark  addressed  to  the  company,  but 
in  that  time  I  had  the  train  of  ideas  and  feelings 
I  have  just  given  flash  through  my  consciousness 
sudden  and  sharp  as  the  crooked  red  streak  that 
springs  out  of  its  black  sheath  like  the  creese  of 
a  Malay  in  his  death-race,  and  stabs  the  earth 
right  and  left  in  its  blind  rage. 

I  don't  den};  that  there  was  a  pang  in  it, — 
yes,  a  stab;  but  there  WES  a  prayer,  too, — the 
"Amen"  belonged  to  that. — Also,  a  vision  of 
a  four-story  brick  house,  nicely  furnished, — I 
actually  saw  many  specific  articles, — curtains, 


2l8   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST -TABLE 

sofas,  tables,  and  others,  and  could  draw  the 
patterns  of  them  at  this  moment, — a  brick  house, 
I  say,  looking  out  on  the  water,  with  a  fair  par- 
lor, and  books  and  busts  and  pots  of  flowers  and 
bird-cages,  all  complete;  and  at  the  window, 
looking  on  the  water,  two  of  us. — "Male  and 
female  created  He  them." — These  two  were 
standing  at  the  window,  when  a  smaller  shape 
that  was  playing  near  them  looked  up  at  me  with 
such  a  look  that  I — I — poured  out  a  glass  of 
water,  drank  it  all  down,  and  then  continued.] 

I  said  I  should  like  to  tell  you  something, 
such  as  the  people  commonly  never  tell,  about 
my  early  recollections.  Should  you  like  to  hear 
them? 

Should  we  like  to  hear  them  ? — said  the 
schoolmistress; — no,  but  we  should  love  to. 

[The  voice  was  a  sweet  one,  naturally,  and 
had  something  very  pleasant  in  its  tone,  just 
then.  The  four-story  brick  house,  which  had 
gone  out  like  a  transparency  when  the  light  be- 
hind it  is  quenched,  glimmered  again  for  a 
moment;  parlor,  books,  busts,  flower-pots,  bird- 
cages, all  complete, — and  the  figures  as  before.] 

We  are  waiting  with  eagerness, Sir, — said  the 
divinity-student. 

[The  transparency  went  out  as  if  a  flash  of 
black  lightning  had  struck  it.] 

If  you  want  to  hear  my  confessions,  the  next 
thing, — I  said, — is  to  know  whether  I  can  trust 
you  with  them.  It  is  only  fair  to  say  that  there 
are  a  great  many  people  in  the  world  that  laugh 
at  such  things,  /think  they  are  fools,  but  per- 
haps you  don't  all  agree  with  me. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2Ip 

Here  are  children  of  tender  age  talked  to  as  if 
they  were  capable  of  understanding  Calvin's 
"Institutes,"  and  nobody  has  honesty  or  sense 
enough  to  tell  the  plain  truth  about  the  little 
wretches;  that  they  are  as  superstitious  as  naked 
savages,  and  such  miserable  spiritual  cowards 
— that  is,  if  they  have  any  imagination — that 
they  will  believe  anything  which  is  taught  them, 
and  a  great  deal  more  which  they  teach  them- 
selves. 

I  was  born  and  bied,  as  I  have  told  you  twen- 
ty times,  among  books  and  those  who  knew 
what  was  in  books.  I  was  carefully  instructed  in 
things  temporal  and  spiritual.  But  up  to  a  con- 
siderable maturity  of  childhood  I  believed  Ra- 
phael and  Michael  Angelo  to  have  been  super- 
human beings.  The  central  doctrine  of  the 
prevalent  religious  faith  in  Christendom  was 
utterly  confused  and  neutralized  in  my  mind  for 
years  by  one  of  those  too  common  stories  of 
actual  life  which  I  overheard  repeated  in  a  whis- 
per.— Why  did  I  not  ask?  you  will  say. —  You 
don't  remember  the  rosy  pudency  of  sensitive 
children.  The  first  instinctive  movement  of  little 
creatures  is  to  make  a  cache,  and  bury  in  it  be- 
liefs, doubts,  hopes  and  terrors.  I  am  uncover- 
ing one  of  these  caches.  Do  you  think  I  was 
necessarily  a  greater  fool  and  coward  than  an- 
other? 

I  was  afraid  of  ships.  Why,  I  could  never 
tell.  The  masts  looked  frightfully  tall, but  they 
were  not  so  tall  as  the  steeple  of  our  old  yellow 
meeting-house.  At  any  rate, I  used  to  hide  my 
eyes  from  the  sloops  and  schooners  that  were 


220  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

wont  to  lie  at  the  end  of  the  bridge,  and  I  con- 
fess that  traces  of  this  undefined  terror  lasted 
very  long.  One  other  source  of  alarm  had  a  still 
more  fearful  significance.  There  was  a  wooden 
HAND, — a  glove-maker's  sign,  which  used  to 
swing  and  creak  in  the  blast,  as  it  hung  from  a 
pillar  before  a  certain  shop  a  mile  or  two  outside 
of  the  city.  Oh,  the  dreadful  hand!  Always 
hanging  there  ready  to  catch  up  a  little  boy, 
who  would  come  home  to  supper  no  more,  nor 
yet  to  bed,  whose  porringer  would  be  laid  away 
empty,  thenceforth,  and  his  half-worn  shoes 
wait  until  his  small  brother  grew  to  fit  them. 

As  for  all  manner  of  superstitious  observances, 
I  used  once  to  think  I  must  have  been  peculiar 
in  having  such  a  list  of  them,  but  I  now  believe 
that  half  the  children  of  the  same  age  go  through 
the  same  experiences.  No  Roman  sooth- 
sayer ever  had  such  a  catalogue  of  omens  as  I 
found  in  the  Sibylline  leaves  of  my  childhood. 
That  trick  of  throwing  a  stone  at  a  tree  and  at- 
taching some  mighty  issue  to  hitting  or  missing, 
which  you  will  find  mentioned  in  one  or  more 
biographies,  I  well  remember.  Stepping  on  or 
over  certain  particular  things  or  spots  —  Dr. 
Johnson's  especial  weakness — I  got  the  habit  of 
at  a  veiy  early  age.  I  won't  swear  that  I  have 
not  some  tendency  to  these  not  wise  practices 
even  at  this  present  date.  [How  many  of  you 
that  read  these  notes  can  say  the  same  thing?] 

With  these  follies  mingled  sweet  delusions, 
which  I  loved  so  well  I  would  not  outgrow 
them,  even  when  it  required  a  voluntary  effort 
to  put  a  momentary  trust  in  them.  Here  is  one 
which  I  cannot  help  telling  you. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  221 

The  firing  of  the  great  guns  at  the  Navy-yard 
is  easily  heard  at  the  place  where  I  was  born 
and  lived.  "There  is  a  ship  of  war  come  in," 
they  used  to  say,  when  they  heard  them.  Of 
course,  I  supposed  that  such  vessels  came  in  un- 
expectedly, after  indefinite  years  of  absence, — 
suddenly  as  falling  stones;  and  that  the  great 
guns  roared  in  their  astonishment  and  delight  at 
the  sight  of  the  old  warship  splitting  the  bay 
with  her  cut -water.  Now,  the  sloop-of-war  the 
Wasp,  Captain  Blakely,  after  gloriously  captur- 
ing the  Reindeer  and  the  Avon,  had  disappear- 
ed from  the  face  of  the  ocean, and  was  supposed 
to  be  lost.  But  there  was  no  proof  of  it,  and  of 
course  for  a  time  hopes  were  entertained  that 
she  might  be  heard  from.  Long  after  the  last 
real  chance  had  utterly  vanished  I  pleased  my- 
self with  the  fond  illusion  that  somewhere  on 
the  waste  of  waters  she  was  still  floating,  and 
there  were  years  during  which  I  never  heard 
the  sound  of  the  great  guns  booming  inland  from 
the  Navy-yard  without  saying  to  myself,  "The 
Wasp  has  come!"  and  almost  thinking  I  could 
see  her,  as  she  rolled  in,  crumpling  the  water 
before  her,  weather-beaten,  barnacled,  with 
shattered  spars  and  threadbare  canvas,  wel- 
comed by  the  shouts  and  tears  of  thousands. 
This  was  one  of  those  dreams  that  I  nursed  and 
never  told.  Let  me  make  a  clean  breast  of  it 
now,  and  say,  that,  so  late  as  to  have  outgrown 
childhood,  perhaps  to  have  got  far  on  towards 
manhood,  when  the  roar  of  the  cannon  has 
struck  suddenly  on  my  ear,  I  have  started  with 
a  thrill  of  vague  expectation  and  tremulous  de- 


222   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

light,  and  the  long-unspoken  words  have  aiticu- 
lated  themselves  in  the  mind's  dumb  whisper, 
The  Wasp  has  come! 

Yes,  children  believe  plenty  of  queer  things. 
I  suppose  all  of  you  have  had  the  pocket-book 
fever  when  you  were  little? — What  do  I  mean? 
Why,  ripping  up  old  pocket-books  in  the  firm 
belief  that  bank-bills  to  an  immense  amount 
were  hidden  in  them. — So,  too,  you  must  all 
remember  some  splendid  unfulfilled  promise  of 
somebody  or  other,  which  fed  you  with  hope 
perhaps  for  years,  and  which  left  a  blank  in 
your  life  which  nothing  has  ever  filled  up. — O. 
T.  quitted  our  household  carrying  with  him  the 
passionate  regrets  of  the  more  youthful  mem- 
bers. He  was  an  ingenious  youngster;  wrote 
wonderful  copies,  and  carved  the  two  initials 
given  above  with  gieat  skill  on  all  available  sur- 
faces. I  thought,  by  the  way,  they  were  all 
gone,  but  the  other  day  I  found  them  on  a  cer- 
tain dooi  which  I  will  show  you  sometime. 
How  it  surprised  me  to  find  them  so  near  the 
ground!  I  had  thought  the  boy  of  no  trivial  di- 
mensions. Well,  O.  T. ,  when  he  went,  made  a 
solemn  promise  to  two  of  us.  I  was  to  have  a 
ship,  and  the  other  a  mar//w-house  (last  syllable 
pronounced  as  in  the  word  tin].  Neither  ever 
came;  but,  oh,  how  many  and  many  a  time  1 
have  stolen  to  the  corner, — the  cars  passed  close 
by  it  at  this  time, — and  looked  up  that  long 
avenue,  thinking  that  he  must  be  coming  now, 
almost  sure,  as  I  turned  to  look  northward,  that 
there  he  would  be,  trudging  toward  me,  the 
ship  in  one  hand  and  the  mar/zVz-house  in  the 
other ! 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   223 

[You  must  not  suppose  that  all  I  am  going  to 
say,  as  well  as  all  I  have  said,  was  told  to  the 
whole  company.  The  young  fellow  whom  they 
call  John  was  in  the  yard,  sitting  on  a  barrel 
and  smoking  a  cheroot,  the  fumes  of  which 
came  in.  not  ungrateful,  through  the  open  win- 
dow. The  divinity  student  disappeared  in  the 
midst  of  our  talk.  The  poor  relation  in  black 
Jpombazine,  who  looked  and  moved  as  it  alt~rrer 
Articulations  weie  elbow-joints,  had  gone  off  to 
her  chamber,  after  waiting  with  a  look  of  soul- 
subduing  decorum  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs  until 
one  of  the  male  sort  had  passed  her  and 
ascended  into  the  upper  regions.  This  is  a 
famous  point  of  etiquette  in  our  boarding-house; 
in  fact,  between  ourselves,  they  make  such  an 
awful  fuss  about  it,  that  I,  for  one,  had  a  great 
deal  rather  have  them  simple  enough  not  to 
think  of  such  matters  at  all.  Our  landlady's 
daughter  said,  the  other  evening,  that  she  was 
going  to  "retire;"  whereupon  the  young  fellow 
they  called  John  took  a  lamp  and  insisted  on 
lighting  her  to  the  foot  of  the  staircase.  Nothing 
would  induce  her  to  pass  by  him,  until  the 
schoolmistress,  saying  in  good  plain  English  that 
it  was  her  bedtime,  walked  straight  by  them 
both,  not  seeming  to  trouble  herself  about  either 
of  them. 

I  have  been  led  away  from  what  I  meant  the 
portion  included  in  these  brackets  to  inform  my 
readers  about.  I  say,  then,  most  of  the  board- 
ers had  left  the  table  about  the  time  when  I  be- 
gan telling  some  of  these  secrets  of  mine, — all 
of  them,  in  fact,  but  the  old  gentleman  opposite 


224  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

and  the  schoolmistress.  I  understand  why  a 
young  woman  should  like  to  hear  these  homely 
but  genuine  experiences  of  early  life, which  are, 
as  I  have  said,  the  little  brown  seeds  of  what 
may  yet  grow  to  be  poems  with  leaves  of  azure 
and  gold;  but  when  the  old  gentleman  pushed 
up  his  chair  nearer  to  me, and  slanted  round  his 
best  ear,  and  once,  when  I  was  speaking  of 
some  trifling,  tender  reminiscence,  drew  a  long 
breath,  with  such  a  tremor  in  it  that  a  little 
more  and  it  would  have  been  a  sob,  why,  then 
I  felt  there  must  be  something  of  nature  in  them 
which  redeemed  their  seeming  insignificance. 
Tell  me,  man  or  woman  with  whom  I  am  whis- 
pering, have  you  not  a  small  store  of  recollec- 
tions, such  as  these  I  am  uncovering,  buried 
beneath  the  dead  leaves  of  many  summers, 
perhaps  under  the  unmelting  snows  of  fast-return- 
ing winters, — a  few  such  recollections,  which, 
if  you  should  write  them  all  out,  would  be 
swept  into  some  careless  editor's  drawer,  and 
might  cost  a  half-hour's  lazy  reading  to  his  sub- 
scribers,— and  yet,  if  Death  should  cheat  you  of 
them,  you  would  not  know  yourself  in  eter- 
nity?] 

I  made  three  acquaintances  at  a  very  early 
period  of  my  life,  my  introduction  to  whom  was 
never  to  be  forgotten.  The  first  unequivocal 
act  of  wrong  that  has  left  its  trace  in  my  mem- 
ory was  this:  it  was  refusing  a  small  favor 
asked  of  me, — nothing  more  than  telling  what 
had  happened  at  school  one  morning.  No 
matter  who  asked  it;  but  there  were  circum- 
stances which  saddened  and  awed  me.  I  had 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  225 

no  heart  to  speak; — I  faltered  some  miserable, 
perhaps  petulant  excuse,  stole  away,  and  the 
first  battle  of  life  was  lost.  What  remorse  fol- 
lowed I  need  not  tell.  Then  and  there,  to  the 
best  of  my  knowledge,  I  first  consciously  took 
Sin  by  the  hand  and  turned  my  back  on  Duty. 
Time  has  led  me  to  look  upon  my  offense  more 
leniently ;  I  do  not  believe  it  or  any  other 
childish  wrong  is  infinite,  as  some  have  pre- 
tended, but  infinitely  finite.  Yet,  oh,  if  I  had 
but  won  that  battle! 

The  great  Destroyer  whose  awful  shadow  it 
was  that  had  silenced  me,  came  near  me, — but 
nevei,  so  as  to  be  distinctly  seen  and  remem- 
bered, during  my  tender  years.  There  flits 
dimly  before  me  the  image  of  a  little  girl,  whose 
name  even  I  have  forgotten, a  schoolmate, whom 
we  missed  one  day,  and  were  told  that  she  had 
died.  But  what  death  was  I  never  had  any  very 
distinct  idea,  until  one  day  I  climbed  the  low 
stone  wall  of  the  old  burial-ground  and  mingled 
with  a  group  that  were  looking  into  a  very 
deep,  long,  narrow  hole,  dug  down  through  the 
green  sod,  down  through  the  brown  loam, down 
through  the  yellow  gravel,  and  there  at  the  bot"- 
tom  was  an  oblong  red  box,  and  a  still,  sharp, 
white  face  of  a  young  man  seen  through  an 
opening  at  one  end  of  it.  When  the  lid  was 
closed,  and  the  gravel  and  stones  rattled  down 
pell-mell,  and  the  woman  in  black,  who  was 
crying  and  wringing  her  hands,  went  off  with 
the  other  mourners,  and  left  him,  then  I  felt 
that  I  had  seen  Death,  and  should  never  forget 
him. 


226  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

One  other  acquaintance  I  made  at  an  earlier 
period  of  life  than  the  habit  of  romancers  auth- 
orizes.— Love,  of  course. — She  was  a  famous 
beauty  afterwards. — I  am  satisfied  that  many 
children  rehearse  their  parts  in  the  drama  of 
life  before  they  have  shed  all  their  milk-teeth. — 
I  think  I  won't  tell  the  story  of  the  golden 
blonde. — I  suppose  everybody  has  had  his 
childish  fancies;  but  sometimes  they  are  pas- 
sionate impulses,  which  anticipate  all  the  trem- 
ulous emotions  belonging  to  a  later  period. 
Most  children  remember  seeing  and  adoring  an 
angel  before  they  were  a  dozen  years  old. 

[The  old  gentleman  had  left  his  chair  oppos- 
ite and  taken  a  seat  by  the  schoolmistress  and 
myself,  a  little  way  from  the  table. — It's  true, 
it's  true, — said  the  old  gentleman. — He  took  hold 
of  a  steel  watch-chain,  which  carried  a  large, 
square  gold  key  at  one  end  and  was  supposed 
to  have  some  kind  of  timekeeper  at  the  other. 
With  some  trouble  he  dragged  up  an  ancient- 
looking,  thick,  silver,  bull's-eye  watch.  He 
looked  at  it  a  moment — hesitated, — touched 
the  inner  corner  of  his  right  eye  with  the  pulp 
of  his  middle  finger,  looked  at  the  face  of 
the  watch,  — then  said  it  was  getting  into 
the  forenoon, — then  opened  the  watch  and 
handed  me  the  loose  outside  case  without  a 
word. — The  watch-paper  had  been  pink  once, 
and  had  a  faint  tinge  still,  as  if  all  its  life  had 
not  yet  quite  faded  out.  Two  little  birds,  a 
flower,  and,  in  small,  school-girl  letters,  a  date 
— 17  .  . — no  matter. — Before  I  was  thirteen  years 
old, — said  the  old  gentleman. — I  don't  know 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   2 27 

what  was  in  that  young  schoolmistress's  head, 
nor  why  she  should  have  done  it;  but  she  took 
out  the  watch  paper  and  put  it  softly  to  her  lips, 
as  if  she  were  kissing  the  poor  thing  that  made 
it  so  long  ago.  The  old  gentleman  took  the 
watch-paper  carefully  from  her,  replaced  it, 
turned  away  and  walked  out,  holding  the  watch 
in  his  hand.  I  saw  him  pass  the  window  a 
moment  after  with  that  foolish  white  hat  on  his 
head;  he  couldn't  have  been  thinking  what  he 
was  about  when  he  put  it  on.  So  the  school- 
mistress and  I  were  left  alone.  I  drew  my  chair 
a  shade  nearer  to  her  and  continued.] 

And  since  I  am  talking  of  early  recollections, 
I  don't  know  why  I  shouldn't  mention  some 
others  that  cling  to  me,  not  that  you  will  attach 
any  very  particular  meaning  to  these  same 
images  so  full  of  significance  to  me,  but  that  you 
will  find  something  parallel  to  them  in  your  own 
memory.  You  remember,  perhaps,  what  I  said 
one  day  about  smells.  There  were  certain 
sounds,  also,  which  had  a  mysterious  suggestive- 
ness  to  me, — not  so  intense,  perhaps,  as  that  con- 
nected with  the  other  sense,  but  yet  peculiar, 
and  never  to  be  forgotten. 

The  first  was  the  creaking  of  the  wood-sleds, 
bringing  their  loads  of  oak  and  walnut  from  the 
country,as  the  slow-swinging  oxen  trailed  them 
along  over  the  complaining  snow,  in  the  cold, 
brown  light  of  early  morning.  -Lying  in  bed 
and  listening  to  their  dreary  music  had  a  pleas- 
ure in  it  akin  to  the  Lucretian  luxury,  or  that 
which  Byron  speaks  of  as  to  be  enjoyed  in  look- 
ing on  at  a  battle  by  one  "who  hath  no  friend, 
no  brother  there." 


228   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

There  was  another  sound,  in  itself  so  sweet, 
and  so  connected  with  one  of  those  simple  and 
curious  superstitions  of  childhood  of  which  I 
have  spoken,  that  I  can  never  cease  to  cheiish 
a  sad  sort  of  love  for  it. — Let  me  tell  the  super- 
stitious fancy  first.  The  Puritan  "Sabbath," 
as  everybody  knows,  began  at  "sundown"  on 
Saturday  evening.  To  such  observance  of  it  I 
was  born  and  bred.  As  the  large,  round  disk 
of  day  declined,  a  stillness, a  solemnity, a  some- 
what melancholy  hush  came  over  us  all.  It  was 
time  for  work  to  cease,  and  for  playthings  to  be 
put  away.  The  world  of  active  life  passed  into 
the  shadow  of  an  eclipse,  not  to  emerge  until 
the  sun  should  sink  again  beneath  the  horizon. 

It  was  in  this  stillness  of  the  world  without 
and  of  the  soul  within  that  the  pulsating  lullaby 
of  the  evening  crickets  used  to  make  itself  most 
distinctly  heard, — so  that  I  well  remember  I  used 
to  think  the  purring  of  these  little  creatures, 
which  mingled  with  the  batrachian  hymns  from 
the  neighboring  swamp,  was  peculiar  to  Satur- 
day evenings.  I  don't  know  that  anything 
could  give  a  clearer  idea  of  the  quieting  and 
subduing  effects  of  the  old  habit  of  observance 
of  what  was  considered  holy  time,  than  this 
strange,  childish  fancy. 

Yes,  and  there  was  still  another  sound  which 
mingled  its  solemn  cadences  with  the  waking 
and  sleeping  dreams  of  my  boyhood.  It  was 
heard  only  at  times, — a  deep, muffled  roar,  which 
rose  and  fell, not  loud, but  vast, — a  whistling  boy 
would  have  drowned  it  for  his  next  neighbor, 
but  it  must  have  been  heard  over  the  space  of  a 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   22p 

hundred  square  miles.  I  used  to  wonder  what 
this  might  be.  Could  it  be  the  roar  of  the 
thousand  wheels  and  the  ten  thousand  footsteps 
jarring  and  tramping  along  the  stones  of  the 
neighboring  city?  That  would  be  continuous, 
but  this,  as  I  have  said,  rose  and  fell  in  regular 
rhythm.  I  remember  being  told,  and  I  suppose 
this  to  have  been  the  true  solution,  that  it  was 
the  sound  of  the  waves, after  a  high  wind, break- 
ing on  the  long  beaches  many  miles  distant. 
I  should  really  like  to  know  whether  any  observ- 
ing people  living  ten  miles,  more  or  less,  in- 
land from  long  beaches,  in  such  a  town,  for 
instance,  as  Cantabridge,  in  the  eastern  part  of 
the  Territory  of  Massachusetts,  have  ever  ob- 
served any  such  sound,  and  whether  it  was  right- 
ly accounted  for  as  above. 

Mingling  with  these  inarticulate  sounds  in  the 
low  murmur  of  memory,  are  the  echoes  of  cer- 
tain voices  I  have  heard  at  rare  intervals.  I 
grieve  to  say  it,  but  our  people,  I  think, have  not 
generally  agreeable  voices.  The  marrowy  or- 
ganisms, with  skins  that  shed  water  like  the  backs 
of  ducks,  with  smooth  surfaces  neatly  padded 
beneath, and  velvet  linings  to  their  singing-pipes, 
are  not  so  common  among  us  as  that  other  pattern 
of  humanity  with  angular  outlines  and  plane 
surfaces,  arid  integuments,  hair  like  the  fibrous 
covering  of  a  cocoa-nut  in  gloss  and  suppleness 
as  well  as  color,  and  voices  at  once  thin  and 
strenuous, —  acidulous  enough  to  produce  effer- 
vescence with  alkalis,  and  stridulous  enough  to 
sing  duets  with  the  katydids.  I  think  our  con- 
versational soprano,  as  sometimes  overheard  in 
the  cars,arising  from  a  group  of  young  persons, 


230  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

who  may  have  taken  the  train  at  one  of  our  great 
industrial  centers,  for  instance, — young  persons 
of  the  female  sex,  we  will  say,  who  have  bustled 
in  full-dressed,  engaged  in  loud  strident  speech, 
and  who,  after  free  discussion,  have  fixed  on 
two  or  more  double  seats,  which  having  secured, 
they  proceed  to  eat  apples  and  hand  round 
daguerreotypes, — I  say,  I  think  the  conversa- 
tional soprano, heard  under  these  circumstances, 
would  not  be  among  the  allurements  the  old 
enemy  would  put  in  requisition, were  he  getting 
up  a  new  temptation  of  St.  Anthony. 

There  are  sweet  voices  among  us,  we  all 
know,  and  voices  not  musical,  it  may  be,  to 
those  who  hear  them  for  the  first  time,  yet 
sweeter  to  us  than  any  we  shall  hear  until  we 
listen  to  some  warbling  angel  in  the  overture  to 
that  eternity  of  blissful  harmonies  we  hope  to 
enjoy.  But  why  should  I  tell  lies?  If  my 
friends  love  me,  it  is  because  I  try  to  tell  the 
truth.  I  never  heard  but  two  voices  in  my  life 
that  frightened  me  by  their  sweetness. 

— Frightened  you? — said  the  schoolmistress. 
— Yes,  frightened  me.  They  made  me  feel  as 
if  there  might  be  constituted  a  creature  with  such 
a  chord  in  her  voice  to  some  string  in  another's 
soul  that  if  she  but  spoke,  he  would  leave  all 
and  follow  her,  though  it  were  into  the  jaws  of 
Erebus.  Our  only  chance  to  keep  our  wits  is, 
that  there  are  so  few  natural  chords  between 
others'  voices  and  this  string  in  our  souls,  and 
that  those  which  at  first  may  have  jarred  a  little 
by  and  by  come  into  harmony  with  it. — But  I 
tell  you  this  is  no  fiction.  You  may  call  the 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   23! 

story  of  Ulysses  and  the  Sirens  a  fable,  but  what 
will  you  say  to  Mario  and  the  poor  lady  who 
followed  him  ? 

Whose  were  those  two  voices  that  bewitched 
me  so? — They  belonged  to  German  women. 
One  was  a  chambermaid,  not  otherwise  fascinat- 
ing.^Ihti  key  6t  my  room  at  a  certain  great 
hotel  was  missing,  and  this  Teutonic  maiden 
was  summoned  to  give  information  respecting 
it.  The  simple  soul  was  evidently  not  long 
from  her  motherland,  and  spoke  with  sweet  un- 
certainty of  dialect.  But  to  hear  her  wonder, 
and  lament  and  suggest,  with  soft,  liquid  inflec- 
tions, and  low,  sad  murmurs,  in  tones  as  full  of 
serious  tenderness  for  the  fate  of  the  lost  key  as 
if  it  had  been  a  child  that  had  strayed  from  its 
mother,  was  so  winning,  that,  had  her  features 
and  figure  been  as  delicious  as  her  accents, — if 
she  had  looked  like  the  marble  Clytie,  for  in- 
stance— why,  all  I  can  say  is — 

[The  schoolmistress  opened  her  eyes  so  wide, 
that  I  stopped  short.] 

I  was  only  going  to  say  that  I  should  have 
drowned  myself.  For  Lake  Erie  was  close  by, 
and  it  is  so  much  better  to  accept  asphyxia, 
which  takes  only  three  minutes  by  the  watch, 
than  a  mesalliance  Jfazk  lasts  fifty  years  to  begin 
with,  and  then  passes  along  down  the  line  of 
descent  (breaking  out  in  all  manner  of  boorish 
manifestations  of  feature  and  manner,  which,  if 
men  were  only  as  short-lived  as  horses,  could 
be  readily  traced  back  through  the  square-roots 
and  the  cube-roots  of  the  family  stem  on  which 
you  have  hung  the  armorial  bearings  of  the  De 


232   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Champignons  or  the  De  la  Morues,  until  one 
came  to  beings  that  ate  with  knives  and  said, 
"Haow?")  that  no  person  of  right  feeling  could 
have  hesitated  for  a  single  moment. 

The  second  of  the  ravishing  voices  I  have 
heard  was,  as  I  have  said,  that  of  another  Ger- 
man woman. — I  suppose  I  shall  ruin  myself  by 
saying  that  such  a  voice  could  not  have  come 
from  any  Americanized  human  being. 

What  was  there  in  it?  said  the  schoolmistress, 
— and,  upon  my  word,  her  tones  were  so  very 
musical,  that  I  almost  wished  I  had  said  three 
voices  instead  of  two,  and  not  made  the  unpa- 
triotic remark  above  reported. — Oh,  I  said,  it 
had  so  much  woman  in  it, — muliebrity^  as  well 
K&  femineity\ — no  self-assertion,  such  as  free 
suffrage  introduces  into  every  word  and  move- 
ment; large,  vigorous  nature,  running  back  to 
those  huge-limbed  Germans  of  Tacitus,  but 
subdued  by  the  reverential  training  and  tuned 
by  the  kindly  culture  of  fifty  generations. 
Sharp  business  habits, a  lean  soil, independence, 
enterprise,  and  east  winds,  are  not  the  best 
things  for  the  larynx.  Still,  you  hear  noble 
voices  among  us, — I  have  known  families  fa- 
mous for  them, — but  ask  the  first  person  you 
meet  a  question,  and  ten  to  one  there  is  a  hard, 
sharp,  metallic,  matter-of-fact  business  clink  in 
the  accents  of  the  answer,  that  produces  the 
effect  of  one  of  those  bells  which  small  trades- 
people connect  with  their  shop-doors, and  which 
spring  upon  your  ear  with  such  vivacity,  as  you 
enter,  that  your  first  impulse  is  to  retire  at  once 
from  the  precincts. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   233 

Ah,  but  I  must  not  forget  that  dear  little 
child  I  saw  and  heard  in  a  French  hospital.  Be- 
tween two  and  three  years  old.  Fell  out  of  her 
chair  and  snapped  both  thigh-bones.  Lying  in 
bed,  patient,  gentle.  Rough  students  round  her, 
some  in  white  aprons, looking  fearfully  business- 
like; but  the  child  placid,  perfectly  still.  I 
spoke  to  her,  and  the  blessed  little  creature  an- 
swered me  in  a  voice  of  such  heavenly  sweet- 
ness, with  that  ready  thrill  in  it  which  you  have 
heard  in  the  thrush's  even-song,  that  I  seem  to 
hear  it  at  this  moment,  while  I  am  writing,  so 
many,  many  years  afterwards.  —  Cest  toutcomme 
un  serin,  said  the  French  student  at  my  side. 

These  are  the  voices  which  struck  the  key- 
note of  my  conceptions  as  to  what  the  sounds 
we  are  to  hear  in  heaven  will  be,  if  we  shall 
enter  through  one  of  the  twelve  gates  of  pearl. 
There  must  be  other  things  besides  aerolites 
that  wander  from  their  own  spheres  to  ours; 
and  when  we  speak  of  celestial  sweetness  or 
beauty  we  may  be  nearer  the  literal  truth  than 
we  dream.  If  mankind  generally  are  the  ship- 
wrecked survivors  of  some  pre-Adamitic  cata- 
clysm, set  adrift  in  these  little  open  boats  of 
humanity  to  make  one  more  trial  to  reach  the 
shore, — as  some  giave  theologians  have  main- 
tained,— if,in  plain  English,  men  are  the  ghosts 
of  dead  devils  who  have  "died  into  life"  (to 
borrow  an  expression  from  Keats), and  walk  the 
earth  in  a  suit  of  living  rags  that  lasts  three  or 
four  score  summers, — why,  there  must  have  been 
a  few  good  spirits  sent  to  keep  them  company, 
and  these  sweet  voices  I  speak  of  must  belong 
to  them. 


234   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

I  wish  you  could  hear  my  sister's  voice, — said 
the  schoolmistress. 

If  it  is  like  yours,  it  must  be  a  pleasant  one, 
— said  I. 

I  never  thought  mine  was  anything, — said 
the  schoolmistress. 

How  should  you  know?  —  said  I. — People 
never  hear  their  own  voices, — any  more  than 
they  see  their  own  faces.  There  is  not  even  a 
looking-glass  for  the  voice.  Of  course,  there  is 
something  audible  to  us  when  we  speak;  but 
that  something  is  not  our  own  voice  as  it  is 
known  to  all  our  acquaintances.  I  think,  if  an 
image  spoke  to  us  in  our  own  tones,  we  should 
not  know  them  in  the  least. — How  pleasant  it 
would  be,  if  in  another  state  of  being  we  could 
have  shapes  like  our  former  selves  for  play- 
things,— we  standing  outside  or  inside  of  them, 
as  we  liked,  and  they  being  to  us  just  what  we 
used  to  be  to  others! 

I  wonder  if  there  will  be  nothing  like  what 
we  call  "play"  after  our  earthly  toys  are  broken, 
— said  the  schoolmistress. 

Hush, — said  I, — what  will  the  divinity-stu- 
dent say? 

[I  thought  she  was  hit,  that  time; — but  the 
shot  must  have  gone  over  her,  or  on  one  side  of 
her;  she  did  not  flinch.] 

Oh, — said  the  schoolmistress — he  must  look 
out  for  my  sister's  heresies;  I  am  afraid  he  will 
be  too  busy  with  them  to  take  care  of  mine. 

Do  you  mean  to  say, — said  I, — that  it  is  your 
sister  whom  that  student — 

[The  young  fellow  commonly  known  as  John, 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   235 

who  had  been  sitting  on  the  barrel,  smoking, 
jumped  off  just  then,  kicked  over  the  barrel, 
gave  it  a  push  with  his  foot  that  set  it  rolling, 
and  stuck  his  saucy-looking  face  in  at  the  win- 
dow so  as  to  cut  my  question  off  in  the  middle; 
and  the  schoolmistress  leaving  the  room  a  few 
minutes  afterwards,  I  did  not  have  a  chance  to  ^ 
finish  it. 

The  young  fellow  came  in  and  sat  down  in  a 
chair,  putting  his  heels  on  the  top  of  another. 

Pooty  girl, — said  he. 

A  fine  young  lady, — I  replied. 

Keeps  a  fust-rate  school,  according  to  ac- 
counts,— said  he, — teaches  all  sorts  of  things, — 
Latin  and  Italian  and  music.  Folks  rich  once, 
— smashed  up.  She  went  right  ahead  as  smait 
as  if  she'd  been  born  to  work.  That's  the  kind 
of  girl  I  go  for.  I'd  marry  her,  only  two  or 
three  other  girls  would  drown  themselves  if  I 
did. 

I  think  the  above  is  the  longest  speech  of  this 
young  fellow's  which  I  have  put  on  record. 
I  do  not  like  to  change  his  peculiar  expressions, 
for  this  is  one  of  those  cases  in  which  the  style 
is  the  man,  as  M.  de  Buffon  says.  The  fact  is, 
the  young  fellow  is  a  good-hearted  creature' 
enough,  only  too  fond  of  his  joke, — and  if  it 
were  not  for  those  heat-lightning  winks  on  one 
side  of  his  face,  I  should  not  mind  his  fun 
much.] 

[Some  days  after  this,  when  the  company 
were  together  again,  I  talked  a  little.] 

I  don't  think  I  have  a  genuine  hatred  for 
anybody.  I  am  well  aware  that  I  differ  herein 


236   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

from  the  sturdy  English  moralist  and  the  stout 
American  tragedian.  I  don't  deny  that  I  hate 
the  sight  of  certain  people;  but  the  qualities 
which  make  me  tend  to  hate  the  man  himself 
are  such  as  I  am  so  much  disposed  to  pity, that, 
except  under  immediate  aggravation,  I  feel 
kindly  enough  to  the  worst  of  them.  It  is  such 
a  sad  thing  to  be  born  a  sneaking  fellow,  so 
much  worse  than  to  inherit  a  hump-back  or  a 
couple  of  club-feet,  that  I  sometimes  feel  as  if 
we  ought  to  love  the  crippled  souls,  if  I  may 
use  this  expression,  with  a  certain  tenderness 
which  we  need  not  waste  on  noble  natures.  One 
who  is  born  with  such  congenital  incapacity  that 
nothing  can  make  a  gentleman  of  him  is  en- 
titled, not  to  our  wrath,  but  to  our  profoundest 
sympathy.  But  as  we  cannot  help  hating  the 
sight  of  these  people, just  as  we  do  that  of  phys- 
ical deformities,  we  gradually  eliminate  them 
from  our  society, — we  love  them,  but  open  the 
window  and  let  them  go.  By  the  time  decent 
people  reach  middle  age  they  have  weeded  their 
circle  pretty  well  of  these  unfortunates,  unless 
they  have  a  taste  for  such  animals;  in  which 
case,  no  matter  what  their  position  may  be, 
there  is  something,  you  may  be  sure,  in  their 
natures  akin  to  that  of  their  wretched  parasites. 

The  divinity  student  wished  to  know  what  I 
thought  of  affinities,  as  well  as  of  antipathies; 
did  I  believe  in  love  at  first  sight? 

Sir,  said  I,  all  men  love  all  women.  That  is 
the  prima-facie  aspect  of  the  case.  The  Court 
of  Nature  assumes  the  law  to  be,  that  all  men 
do  so;  and  the  individual  man  is  bound  to  show 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST- TABLE   237 

cause  why  he  does  not  love  any  particular 
woman.  A  man,  says  one  of  my  old  black-letter 
law-books,  may  show  divers  good  reasons,  as 
thus:  He  hath  not  seen  the  person  named  in 
the  indictment;  she  is  of  tender  age,  or  the  re- 
verse of  that;  she  hath  ceitain  personal  disqual- 
ifications,^— as,  for  instance,  she  is  a  blacka- 
moor, or  hath  an  ill-favored  countenance;  or, 
his  capacity  of  loving  being  limited,  his  affec- 
tions are  engrossed  by  a  previous  comer;  and 
so  of  other  conditions.  Not  the  less  is  it  true 
that  he  is  bound  by  duty  and  inclined  by  nature 
to  love  each  and  every  woman.  Therefore  it  is 
that  each  woman  virtually  summons  every  man 
to  show  cause  why  he  doth  not  love  her.  This 
is  not  by  written  document,  or  direct  speech, for 
the  most  part,  but  by  certain  signs  of  silk,  gold, 
and  other  materials,  which  sa}'  to  all  men, — 
Look  on  me  and  love,  as  in  duty  bound.  Then 
the  man  pleadeth  his  special  incapacity, whatso- 
ever that  may  be, — as,  for  instance,  impecuni- 
osit}-,  or  that  he  hath  one  or  many  wives  in  his 
household,  or  that  he  is  of  mean  figure, or  small 
capacity ;  of  which  reasons  it  may  be  noted,  that 
the  first  is,  according  to  late  decisions,  of  chief- 
est  authority. — So  far  the  old  law-book.  But 
there  is  a  note  from  an  older  authority,  saying 
that  every  woman  doth  love  each  and  every 
man,  except  there  be  some  good  reason  to  the 
contrary ;  and  a  very  observing  friend  of  mine, 
a  young  unmarried  clergyman,  tells  me,  that,  so 
far  as  his  experience  goes,  he  has  reason  to 
think  the  ancient  author  had  fact  to  justify  his 
statement. 


238   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

I'll  tell  you  how  it  is  with  the  pictures  of 
women  we  fall  in  love  with  at  first  sight. 

We  ain't  talking  about  pictures, — said  the 
landlady's  daughter, — we're  talking  about 
women. 

I  understood  that  we  were  speaking  of  love  at 
sight, — I  remarked,  mildly.  Now,  as  all  a  man 
knows  about  a  woman  he  looks  at  is  just  what 
a  picture  as  big  as  a  copper,  or  a  "nickel," 
rather,  at  the  bottom  of  his  eye  can  teach  him, 
I  think  I  am  right  in  saying  we  are  talking 
about  the  pictures  of  women. — Well,  now,  the 
reason  why  a  man  is  not  desperately  in  love 
with  ten  thousand  women  at  once  is  just  that 
which  prevents  all  our  portraits  being  distinctly 
seen  upon  that  wall.  They  all  are  painted 
here  by  reflection  from  our  faces,  but  because 
all  of  them  are  painted  on  each  spot,  and  each 
on  the  same  surface,  and  many  other  objects  at 
the  same  time,  no  one  is  seen  as  a  picture.  But 
darken  a  chamber  and  let  a  single  pencil  of  rays 
in  through  a  key-hole,  then  you  have  a  picture 
on  the  wall.  We  never  fall  in  love  with  a 
woman  in  distinction  from  women,  until  we  can 
get  an  image  of  her  through  a  pin-hole;  and 
then  we  can  see  nothing  else,  and  nobody  but 
ourselves  can  see  the  image  in  our  mental  cam- 
era-obscura. 

My  friend,  the  Poet,  tells  me  he  has  to  leave 
town  whenever  the  anniversaries  come  round. 

What's  the  difficulty?  Why,  they  all  want 
him  to  get  up  and  make  speeches,  or  songs,  or 
toasts;  which  is  just  the  very  thing  he  doesn't 
want  to  do.  He  is  an  old  story,  he  says,  and 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   239 

hates  to  show  off  on  these  occasions.  But  they 
tease  him,  and  coax  him,  aud  can't  do  without 
him,  and  feel  all  over  his  poor  weak  head 
until  they  get  their  fingers  on  ihejontandle  (the 
Professor  will  tell  you  what  this  means, — he 
says  the  one  at  the  top  of  the  head  always  re- 
mains open  in  poets),  until,  by  gentle  pressure 
on  that  soft  pulsating  spot,  they  stupefy  him  to 
the  point  of  acquiescence. 

There  are  times,  though,  he  says,  when  it  is 
a  pleasure,  before  going  to  some  agreeable 
meeting,to  rush  out  into  one's  garden  and  clutch 
up  a  handful  of  what  grows  there, — weeds  and 
violets  together, — not  cutting  them  off,but  pull- 
ing them  up  by  the  roots  with  the  brown  earth 
they  grow  in  sticking  to  them.  That's  his  idea 
of  a  post-prandial  performance.  Look  here, 
now.  These  verses  I  am  going  to  read  you,  he 
tells  me,  were  pulled  up  by  the  roots  just  in  that 
way,  the  other  day. — Beautiful  entertainment, 
— names  there  on  the  plates  that  flow  from  all 
English-speaking  tongues  as  familiarly  as  ana 
or  the;  entertainers  known  wherever  good 
poetry  and  fair  title-pages  are  held  in  esteem ; 
guest  a  kind-hearted,  modest,  genial,  hopeful 
poet,  who  sings  to  the  hearts  of  his  countrymen, 
the  British  people,  the  songs  of  cheer  which 
the  better  days  to  come,  as  all  honest  souls 
trust  and  believe,  will  turn  into  the  prose  of 
common  life.  My  friend,  the  Poet,  says  you 
must  not  read  such  a  string  of  verses  too  liter- 
ally. If  he  trimmed  it  nicely  below  you  wouldn't 
see  the  roots,  he  says,  and  he  likes  to  keep 
them,  and  a  little  of  the  soil  clinging  to  them. 


240  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

This  is  the  farewell  my  friend,  the  Poet,  read 
to  his  and  our  friend,  the  Professor: — 

A  GOOD  TIME  GOING. 

Brave  singer  of  the  coming  time, 

Sweet  minstrel  of  the  joyous  present, 
Crowned  with  the  noblest  wreath  of  rhyme, 

The  holly-leaf  of  Ayrshire's  peasant, 
Good-bye!  Good-bye! — Our  hearts  and  hands, 

Our  lips  in  honest  Saxon  phrases, 
Cry,  God  be  with  him,  till  he  stands 

His  feet  among  the  English  daisies! 

'Tis  here  we  part;— for  other  eyes 

The  busy  deck,  the  fluttering  streamer, 
The  dripping  arms  that  plunge  and  rise, 

The  waves  in  foam,  the  ship  in  tremor, 
The  kerchiefs  waving  from  the  pier, 

The  cloudy  pillar  gliding  o'er  him, 
The  deep  blue  desert,  lone  and  drear, 

With  heaven  above  and  home  before  him! 

His  home! — the  Western  giant  smiles, 

And  twirls  the  spotty  globe  to  find  it, — 
This  little  speck  of  British  Isles? 

'Tis  but  a  freckle, — never  mind  it! 
He  laughs,  and  all  his  prairies  roll, 

Each  gurgling  cataract  roars  and  chuckles, 
And  ridges  stretched  from  pole  to  pole 

Heave  till  they  crack  their  iron  knuckles. 

But  Memory  blushes  at  the  sneer, 

And  Honor  turns  with  frown  defiant, 
And  Freedom,  leaning  on  her  spear, 

Laughs  louder  than  the  laughing  giant: — 
"An  islet  is  a  world,"  she  said, 

"When  glory  with  her  dust  has  blended, 
And  Britain  keeps  her  noble  dead 

Till  earth  and  seas  and  skies  are  rended!" 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   24! 

Beneath  each  swinging  forest-bough 

Some  arm  as  stout  in  death  reposes, — 
From  wave-washed  foot  to  heaven-kissed  brow 

Her  valor's  life-blood  runs  in  roses; 
Nay,  let  our  brothers  of  the  West 

Write  smiling  in  their  florid  pages, 
One-half  her  soil  has  walked  the  rest 

In  poets,  heroes,  martyrs,  sages! 

Hugged  in  the  clinging  billow's  clasp, 

From  sea-weed  fringe  to  mountain  heather, 
The  British  oak  with  rooted  grasp 

Her  slender  handful  holds  together, — 
With  cliffs  of  white  and  bowers  of  green, 

And  Ocean  narrowing  to  caress  her, 
And  hills  and  threaded  streams  between, — 

Our  little  mother  isle,  God  bless  her! 

In  earth's  broad  temple  where  we  stand, 

Fanned  by  the  eastern  gales  that  brought  us, 
We  hold  the  missal  in  our  hand, 

Bright  with  the  lines  our  Mother  taught  us; 
Where'er  its  blazoned  page  betrays 

The  glistening  links  of  gilded  fetters, 
Behold,  the  half-turned  leaf  displays 

Her  rubric  stained  in  crimson  letters! 

Enough!     To  speed  a  parting  friend 

'Tis  vain  alike  to  speak  and  listen; — 
Yet  stay, — these  feeble  accents  blend 

With  rays  of  light  from  eyes  that  glisten. 
Good-bye!  once  more, — and  kindly  tell 

In  words  of  peace  the  young  world's  story, — 
And  say,  besides, — we  love  too  well 

Our  mothers'  soil,  our  fathers'  glory! 

When  my  friend,  the  Professor,  found  that 
my  friend,  the  Poet,  had  been  coming  out  in 
this  full-blown  style,  he  got  a  little  excited,  as 
you  may  have  seen  a  canary,  sometimes,  when 


242  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

another  strikes  up.  The  Professor  says  he 
knows  he  can  lecture,  and  he  thinks  he  can 
write  verses.  At  any  rate,  he  has  often  tried, 
and  now  he  was  determined  to  try  again.  So 
when  some  professional  friends  of  his  called 
him  up,  one  day,  aftei  a  feast  of  reason  and  a 
regular  "freshet"  of  soul  which  had  lasted 
two  or  three  hours,  he  read  them  these  verses. 
He  introduced  them  with  a  few  remarks,  he 
told  me,  of  which  the  only  one  he  remembered 
was  this:  that  he  had  rather  write  a  single  line 
which  one  among  them  should  think  worth  re- 
membering than  set  them  all  laughing  with  a 
string  of  epigrams.  It  was  all  right,  I  don't 
doubt;  at  any  rate,  that  was  his  fancy  then, and 
perhaps  another  time  he  may  be  obstinately  hi- 
larious; however,  it  may  be  that  he  is  growing 
graver,  for  time  is  a  fact  so  long  as  clocks  and 
watches  continue  to  go,  and  a  cat  can't  be  a 
kitten  always,  as  the  old  gentleman  opposite 
said  the  other  day. 

You  must  listen  to  this  seriously,  for  I  think 
the  Professor  was  very  much  in  earnest  when 
he  wrote  it. 

THE  TWO  ARMIES. 

As  life's  unending  column  pours, 

Two  marshaled  hosts  are  seen, — 
Two  armies  on  the  trampled  shores 

That  death  flows  black  between. 

One  marches  to  the  drum-beat's  roll, 

The  wide-mouthed  clarion's  bray, 
And  bears  upon  a  crimson  scroll. 

"Our  glory  is  to  slay." 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  243 

One  moves  in  silence  by  the  stream, 

With  sad,   yet  watchful  eyes, 
Calm  as  the  patient  planet's  gleam 

That  walks  the  clouded  skies. 

Along  in  front  no  sabers  shine, 

No  blood-red  pennons  wave; 
Its  banner  bears  the  single  line, 

"Our  duty  is  to  save." 

For  those  no  deathbed's  lingering  shade; 

At  Honor's  trumpet-call, 
With  knitted  brow  and  lifted  blade 

In  Glory's  arms  they  fall. 

For  these  no  clashing  falchions  bright, 

No  stirring  battle-cry; 
The  bloodless  stabber  calls  by  night, — 

Each  answers,  "Here  am  I!" 

For  those  the  sculptor's  laureled  bust, 

The  builder's  marble  piles, 
The  anthems  pealing  o'er  their  dust 

Through  long  cathedral  aisles. 

For  these  the  blossom-sprinkled  turf 

That  floods  the  lonely  graves, 
When  Spring  rolls  in  her  sea-green  surf 

In  flowery-foaming  waves. 

Two  paths  lead  upward  from  below, 

And  angels  wait  above, 
Who  count  each  burning  life-drop's  flow, 

Each  falling  tear  of  love. 

Though  from  the  Hero's  bleeding  breast 

Her  pulses  Freedom  drew 
Though  the  white  lilies  in  her  crest 

Sprang  from  that  scarlet  dew,— 


244   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

While  Valor's  haughty  champions  wait 

Till  all  their  scars  are  shown, 
Love  walks  unchallenged  through  the  gate, 

To  sit  beside  the  Throne! 


X. 


[THE  schoolmistress  came  down  with  a  rose 
in  her  hair, — a  fresh  June  rose.  She  had  been 
walking  early ;  she  has  brought  back  two  others, 
— one  on  each  cheek. 

I  told  her  so,  in  some  such  pretty  phrase  as  I 
could  muster  for  the  occasion.  Those  two 
blush-roses  I  just  spoke  of  turned  into  a  couple 
of  damasks.  I  suppose  all  this  went  through 
my  mind, for  this  was  what  I  went  on  to  say: — J 

I  love  the  damask  rose  best  of  all.  The  flow- 
ers our  mothers  and  sisters  used  to  love  and 
cherish,  those  which  grow  beneath  our  eaves 
and  by  our  doorstep,  are  the  ones  we  always 
love  best.  If  the  Houyhnhnms  should  ever 
catch  me,  and,  finding  me  particularly  vicious 
and  unmanageable,  send  a  man-tamer  to  Rareyfy 
me,  I'll  tell  you  what  drugs  he  would  have 
to  take  and  how  he  would  have  to  use  them. 
Imagine  yourself  reading  a  number  of  the 
Houyhnhnm  Gazette,  giving  an  account  of  such 
an  experiment. 

'MAN-TAMING  EXTRAORDINARY." 
"The     soft-hoofed   semi-quadruped    recently 
captured  was    subjected    to  the  art  of   our  dis- 
tinguished man-tamer  in  presence  of  a  numerous 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   245 

assembly.  The  animal  was  led  in  by  two  stout 
ponies,  closely  confined  by  straps  to  prevent  his 
sudden  and  dangerous  tricks  of  shoulder-hitting 
and  foot-striking.  His  countenance  expressed 
the  utmost  degree  of  ferocity  and  cunning. 

"The  operator  took  a  handful  of  budding  lilac- 
leaves,  and  crushing  them  slightly  between  his 
hoofs, so  as  to  bring  out  their  peculiar  fragrance,, 
fastened  them  to  the  end  of  a  long  pole  and  held 
them  towards  the  creature.  Its  expression 
changed  in  an  instant, — it  drew  in  their  fra- 
grance eagerly,  and  attempted  to  seize  them  with 
its  soft,  split  hoofs.  Having  thus  quieted  his 
suspicious  subject,  the  operator  proceeded  to  tie 
a  blue  hyacinth  to  the  end  of  the  pole,  and  held 
it  out  towards  the  wild  animal.  The  effect  was 
magical.  Its  eyes  filled  as  if  with  rain-drops, 
and  its  lips  trembled  as  it  pressed  them  to  the 
flower.  After  this  it  was  perfectly  quiet,  and 
brought  a  measure  of  corn  to  the  man  tamer, 
without  showing  the  least  disposition  to  strike 
with  the  feet  or  hit  from  the  shoulder." 

That  will  do  for  the  Houyhnhnm  Gazette. — 
Do  you  wonder  why  poets  talk  so  much  about 
flowers?  Don't  you  think  a  poem,  which,  for 
the  sake  of  being  original,  should  leave  them 
out,would  be  like  those  verses  where  the  letter 
a  or  e  or  some  other  is  omitted?  No, — they  will 
bloom  over  and  over  again  in  poems  as  in  the 
summer  fields,  to  the  end  of  time,  always  old  and 
always  new.  Why  should  we  be  more  shy  of 
repeating  ourselves  than  the  spring  be  tired  of 
blossoms  or  the  night  of  stars?  Look  at  Nature. 
She  never  wearies  of  saying  over  her  floral  pater- 


246  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

noster.  In  the  crevices  of  Cyclopean  walls, — in 
the  dust  where  men  lie,  dust  also, — on  the 
mounds  that  bury  huge  cities, — the  Birs  Nim- 
rud  and  the  Babel-heap, — still  that  same  sweet 
prayer  and  benediction.  The  Amen!  of  Nature 
is  always  a  flower. 

Are  you  tired  of  my  trivial  personalities, — 
those  splashes  and  streaks  of  sentiment,  some- 
times perhaps  of  sentimentality,  which  you 
may  see  when  I  show  you  my  heart's  corolla 
as  if  it  were  a  tulip?  Pray,  do  not  give  }'our- 
self  the  trouble  to  fancy  me  an  idiot  whose 
conceit  it  is  to  treat  himself  as  an  exceptional 
being.  It  is  because  you  are  just  like  me  that  I 
talk  and  know  that  you  will  listen.  We  are 
splashed  and  streaked  with  sentiments, —  not 
precisely  with  the  same  tints,  or  in  exactly  the 
same  patterns,  but  by  the  same  hand  and  from 
the  same  palette. 

I  don't  believe  any  of  you  happen  to  have  just 
the  same  passion  for  the  blue  hyacinth  which  I 
have, — very  certainly  not  for  the  crushed  lilac- 
leaf-buds;  many  of  you  do  not  know  how  sweet 
they  are.  You  love  the  smell'  of  the  sweet-fern 
and  thebayberry  leaves,!  don't  doubt  ;but  I  hard- 
ly think  that  the  last  bewitches  you  with  young 
memories  as  it  does  me.  For  the  same  reason  I 
come  back  to  damask  roses,  after  having  raised 
a  good  many  of  the  rarer  varieties.  I  like  to  go 
to  operas  and  concerts,  but  there  are  queer  little 
old  homely  sounds  that  are  better  than  music  to 
me.  However,!  suppose  it's  foolish  to  tell  such 
things. 

It  is  pleasant  to  be  foolish  at  the  right  time, — 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   247 

said  the  divinity  student; — saying  it,  however, 
in  one  of  the  dead  languages,  which  I  think 
are  unpopular  for  summer  reading,  and  there- 
fore do  not  bear  quotation  as  such. 

Well,  now, — said  I, — suppose  a  good,  clean, 
wholesome-looking  countryman's  cart  stops  op- 
posite my  door. — Do  I  want  huckleberries? — If 
I  do  not,  there  are  those  that  do.  Thereupon 
my  soft-voiced  handmaid  bears  out  a  large 
tin  pan,  and  then  the  wholesome  countryman, 
heaping  the  peck-measure,  spreads  his  broad 
hands  around  its  lower  arc  to  confine  the  wild 
and  frisky  berries,  as  they  run  nimbly  along  the 
narrowing  channel  until  they  tumble  rustling 
down  in  a  black  cascade  and  tinkle  on  the  re- 
sounding metal  beneath, — I  won't  say  that  this 
rushing  huckleberry  hail-storm  has  not  more 
music  for  me  than  the  "Anvil  Chorus." 

I  wonder  how  my  great  trees  are  getting  on 
this  summer. 

Where  are  your  great  trees,  Sir? — said  the 
divinity  student. 

Oh,  all  around  New  England.  I  call  all  trees 
mine  that  I  have  put  my  wedding-ring  on,  and 
I  have  as  many  tree-wives  as  Brigham  Young 
has  human  ones. 

One  set's  as  green  as  the  other, — exclaimed  a 
boarder,  who  has  never  been  identified. 

They're  all  Bloomers, — said  the  young  fellow 
called  John. 

[I  should  have  rebuked  this  trifling  with 
language,  if  our  landlady's  daughter  had  not 
asked  me  just  then  what  I  meant  by  putting  my 
wedding-ring  on  a  tree.] 


248   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Why,  measuring  it  with  my  thirty-foot  tape, 
my  dear, — said  I, — I  have  worn  a  tape  almost 
out  on  the  rough  bark  of  our  old  New  England 
elms  and  other  big  trees. — Don't  you  want  to 
hear  me  talk  trees  a  little  now?  That  is  one  of 
my  specialties. 

[So  they  all  agreed  that  they  should  like  to 
hear  me  talk  about  trees.] 

I  want  you  to  understand,  in  the  first  place, 
that  I  have  a  most  intense,  passionate  fondness 
for  trees  in  general,  and  have  had  several  roman- 
tic attachments  to  certain  trees  in  particular. 
Now,  if  you  expect  me  to  hold  forth  in  a  "scien- 
tific" way  about  my  tree-loves, — to  talk,  for  in- 
stance,of  the  Ulmus  Americana, and  describe  the 
ciliated  edges  of  its  samara,  and  all  that, — you 
are  an  anserine  individual,  and  I  must  refer  you 
to  a  dull  friend  who  will  discourse  to  you  of  such 
matters.  What  should  you  think  of  a  lover  who 
should  describe  the  idol  of  his  heart  in  the 
language  of  science,  thus:  Class,  Mammalia; 
Order,  Primates;  Genus, Homo;  Species,  Euro- 
peus;  Variety,  Brown;  Individual,  Ann  Eliza; 
Dental  Formula,  *'  f-f  c  i-BJ-  p  |Ef  m  |Ef ,  and 
so  on? 

No,  my  friends,  I  shall  speak  of  trees  as  we 
see  them,  love  them,  adore  them  in  the  fields, 
where  they  are  alive,  holding  their  green  sun- 
shades over  our  heads,  talking  to  us  with  their 
hundred  thousand  whispering  tongues,  looking 
down  on  us  with  that  sweet  meekness  which  be- 
longs to  huge, but  limited  organisms, — which  one 
sees  in  the  brown  eyes  of  oxen,  but  most  in  the 
patient  posture,  the  outstretched  arms,  and  the 
heavy  drooping  robes  of  these  vast  beings  en- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   249 

clowed  with  life,  but  not  with  soul — which  out- 
grow and  outlive  us,  but  stand  helpless, — poor 
things! — while  nature  dresses  and  undresses 
them,  like  so  many  full-sized  but  underwitted 
children. 

Did  you  ever  read  old  Daddy  Gilpin?  Slow- 
est of  men,  even  of  Englishmen;  yet  delicious 
in  his  slowness,  as  is  the  light  of  a  sleepy  eye 
in  woman.  I  always  supposed  "Dr.  Syntax" 
was  written  to  make  fun  of  him.  I  have  a  whole 
set  of  his  works,  and  am  very  proud  of  it,  with 
its  gray  paper,  and  open  type,  and  long  ff,  and 
orange  juice  landscapes.  The  Pere  Gilpin  had 
the  kind  of  science  I  like  in  the  study  of  nature, 
— a  little  less  observation  than  White  of  Sel- 
borne,  but  a  little  more  poetry. — Just  think  of 
applying  the  Linnaean  system  to  an  elm!  Who 
cares  how  many  stamens  or  pistils  that  little 
brown  flower,  which  comes  out  before  the  leaf, 
may  have  to  classify  it  by  ?  What  we  want  is 
the  meaning,  the  character,  the  expression  of  a 
tree,  as  a  kind  and  as  an  individual. 

There  is  a  mother-idea  in  each  particular  kind 
of  tree,  which,  if  well  marked,  is  probably  em- 
bodied in  the  poetry  of  every  language.  Take 
the  oak,  for  instance,  and  we  find  it  always 
standing  as  a  type  of  strength  and  endurance.  I 
wonder  if  you  ever  thought  of  the  single  mark 
of  supremacy  which  distinguishes  this  tree  from 
all  our  other  forest  trees?  All  the  rest  of  them 
shirk  the  work  of  resisting  gravity;  the  oak 
alone  defies  it.  It  chooses  the  horizontal  direc- 
tion for  its  limbs,  so  that  their  whole  weight 
may  tell, — and  then  stretches  them  out  fifty  or 


250  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

sixty  feet,  so  that  the  strain  may  be  mighty 
enough  to  be  worth  resisting.  You  will  find, 
that,in  passing  from  the  extreme  downward  droop 
of  the  branches  of  the  weeping  willow  to  the  ex- 
treme upward  inclination  of  those  of  the  poplar, 
they  sweep  nearly  half  a  circle.  At  ninety  de- 
grees the  oak  stops  short;  to  slant  upwards 
another  degree  would  mark  infirmity  of  purpose ; 
to  bend  downwards,  weakness  of  organization. 
The  American  elm  betrays  something  of  both ; 
yet  sometimes,  as  we  shall  see,  puts  on  a  cer- 
tain resemblance  to  its  sturdier  neighbor. 

It  won't  do  to  be  exclusive  in  our  taste  about 
trees.  There  is  hardly  one  of  them  which  has 
not  peculiar  beauties  in  some  fitting  place  for  it. 
I  remember  a  tall  poplar  of  monumental  propor- 
tions and  aspect,  a  vast  pillar  of  glossy  green, 
placed  on  the  summit  of  a  lofty  hill,  and  a  bea- 
con to  all  the  country  round.  A  native  of  that 
region  saw  fit  to  build  his  house  very  near  it, 
and  having  a  fancy  that  it  might  blow  down 
sometime  or  other,  and  exterminate  himself  and 
any  incidental  relatives  who  might  be  "stopping" 
or  "tarrying"  with  him, — also  laboring  under  the 
delusion  that  human  life  is  under  all  circum- 
stances to  be  preferred  to  vegetable  existence, — 
had  the  great  poplar  cut  down.  It  is  so  easy  to 
say,  "It  is  only  a  poplar!"  and  so  much  harder 
to  replace  its  living  cone  than  to  build  a  granite 
obelisk. 

I  must  tell  you  about  some  of  my  tree-wives. 
I  was  at  one  period  of  my  life  much  devoted  to 
the  young  lady  population  of  Rhode  Island,  a 
small  but  delightful  State  in  the  neighborhood 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   251 

of  Pawtucket.  The  number  of  inhabitants  not 
being  very  large,!  had  leisure,  during  my  visits 
to  the  Providence  Plantations,  to  inspect  the 
face  of  the  country  in  the  intervals  of  more  fas- 
cinating studies  of  physiognomy.  I  heard  some 
talk  of  a  great  elm  a  short  distance  from  the  lo- 
cality just  mentioned.  "Let  us  see  the  great 
elm,"  I  said,  and  proceeded  to  find  it, — knowing 
that  it  was  on  a  certain  farm  in  a  place  called 
Johnston,  if  I  remember  rightly.  I  shall  never 
forget  my  ride  and  my  introduction  to  the 
great  Johnston  elm. 

I  always  tremble  for  a  celebrated  tree  when  I 
approach  it  for  the  first  time.  Provincialism 
has  no  scale  of  excellence  in  man  or  vegetable; 
it  never  knows  a  first-rate  article  of  either  kind 
when  it  has  it,  and  is  constantly  taking  second 
and  third-rate  ones  for  Nature's  best.  I  have 
often  fancied  the  tree  was  afraid  of  me,  and  that 
a  sort  of  shiver  came  over  it  as  over  a  betrothed 
maiden  when  she  first  stands  before  the  un- 
known to  whom  she  has  been  plighted.  Before 
the  measuring  tape  the  proudest  tree  of  them  all 
quails  and  shrinks  into  itself.  All  those  stories 
of  four  or  five  men  stretching  their  arms  around 
it  and  not  touching  each  other's  fingers,  of  one's 
pacing  the  shadow  at  noon,  and  making  it  so 
many  hundred  feet,  die  upon  its  leafy  lips  in 
the  presence  of  the  awful  ribbon  which  has 
strangled  so  many  false  pretensions. 

As  I  rode  along  the  pleasant  way,  watching 
eagerly  for  the  object  of  my  journey,  the  round- 
ed tops  of  the  elms  rose  from  time  to  time  at  the 
roadside.  Wherever  one  looked  taller  and  fuller 


252      THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

than  the  rest,  I  asked  myself,  "Is  this  it?"  But 
as  I  drew  nearer,  they  grew  smaller, — or  it 
proved,  perhaps,  that  two,  standing  in  a  line, 
had  looked  like  one,  and  so  deceived  me.  At 
last,  all  at  once,  when  I  was  not  thinking  of  it, 
— I  declare  to  you  it  makes  my  flesh  creep  when 
I  think  of  it  now, — all  at  once  I  saw  a  great, 
green  cloud  swelling  in  the  horizon,  so  vast,  so 
symmetrical,  of  such  Olympian  majesty  and  im- 
perial supremacy  among  the  lesser  f 01  est  growths, 
that  my  heart  stopped  short,  then  jumped 
at  my  ribs  as  a  hunter  springs  at  a  five-barred 
gate,  and  I  felt  all  through  me,  without  need  of 
uttering  the  words, — "This  is  it." 

You  will  find  this  tree  described,  with  many 
others, in  the  excellent  Report  upon  the  Trees  and 
Shrubs  of  Massachusetts.  The  author  has  given 
my  friend,  the  Professor,  credit  for  some  of  his 
measurements,  but  measured  this  tree  himself, 
carefully.  It  is  a  grand  elm  for  size  of  trunk, 
spread  of  limbs,  and  muscular  development, — 
one  of  the  first, perhaps  the  first,  of  the  first  class 
of  New  England  elms. 

The  largest  actual  girth  I  have  ever  found  at  five 
feet  from  the  ground  is  in  the  great  elm  lying  a 
stone's  throw  or  two  north  of  the  main  road  (if 
my  points  of  compass  are  right)  in  Springfield. 
But  this  has  much  the  appearance  of  having  been 
formed  by  the  union  of  two  trunks  growing  side 
by  side. 

The  West  Springfield  elm  and  one  upon 
Northampton  Meadows  belong  also  to  the  first 
class  of  trees. 

There  is  a  noble  old  wreck  of  an  elm  at  Hat- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   253 

field,  which  used  to  spread  its  claws  out  over  a 
circumference  of  thirty-five  feet  or  more  before 
they  covered  the  foot  of  its  bole  up  with  earth. 
This  is  the  American  elm  most  like  an  oak  of 
any  I  have  ever  seen. 

The  Sheffield  elm  is  equally  remarkable  for 
size  and  perfection  of  form.  I  have  seen  nothing 
that  comes  near  it  in  Berkshire  County,  and  few 
to  compare  with  it  anywhere.  I  am  not  sure 
that  I  remember  any  other  first-class  elms  of 
New  England,  but  there  may  be  many. 

What  makes  a  first-class  elm?-— Why,  size 
in  the  first  place,  and  chiefly.  Anything  over 
twenty  feet  of  clear  girth,  five  feet  above 
the  ground,  with  a  spread  of  branches  a 
hundred  feet  across,  may  claim  that  title  ac- 
cording to  my  scale.  All  of  them, with  the  ques- 
tionable exception  of  the  Springfield  tree  above 
referred  to,  stop,  so  far  as  my  experience  goes, 
at  about  twenty-two  or  twenty-three  feet  of  girth 
and  a  hundred  and  twenty  of  spread. 

Elms  of  the  second  class,  generally  ranging 
from  fourteen  to  eighteen  feet,  are  comparatively 
common.  The  queen  of  them  all  is  that  glori- 
ous tree  near  one~6F  the  churches  in  Springfield. 
Beautiful  and  stately  she  is  beyond  all  praise. 
The  "great  tree"  on  Boston  Common  comes  in 
the  second  rank,  as  dees  the  one  at  Cohasset, 
which  used  to  have,  and  probably  has  still,  a 
head  as  round  as  an  apple-tree, and  that  at  New- 
buryport,  with  scores  of  others  which  might  be 
mentioned.  The  last  two  have  perhaps  been 
over-celebrated.  Both,  however,  are  pleasing 
vegetables.  The  poor  old  Pittsfield  elm  lives  on 


254  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

its  past  reputation.  A  wig  of  false  leaves  is  in- 
dispensable to  make  it  presentable. 

[I  don't  doubt  there  may  be  some  monster 
elm  or  other,  vegetating  green,  but  inglorious, 
in  some  remote  New  England  village,  which 
only  wants  a  sacred  singer  to  make  it  celebrated. 
Send  us  your  measurements — (certified  by  the 
postmaster,  to  avoid  possible  imposition), — cir- 
cumference five  f'eet  from  soil, length  of  line  from 
bough-end  to  bough-end,  and  we  will  see  what 
can  be  done  for  you.] 

I  wish  somebody  would  get  us  up  the  following 
work: — 

SYLVA  NOVANGLICA. 

Photographs  of  New  England  Elms  ard  other 
Trees,  taken  upon  the  Same  Scale  of  Magnitude. 
With  Letter-Press  Descriptions  by  a  Dis- 
tinguished Literary  Gentleman.  Boston. 

&  Co.  185—. 

The  same  camera  should  be  used, — so  far  as 
possible, — at  a  fixed  distance.  Our  friend,  who 
is  giving  us  so  many  interesting  figures  in  his 
"Trees  of  America,"  must  not  think  this  Pros- 
pectus invades  his  province;  a  dozen  portraits, 
with  lively  descriptions,  would  be  a  pretty  com- 
plement to  his  larger  work,  which,  so  far  as 
published,  I  find  excellent.  If  my  plan  were 
carried  out,  and  another  series  of  a  dozen 
English  trees  photographed  on  the  same  scale, 
the  comparison  would  be  charming. 

It  has  always  been  a  favorite  idea  of  mine  to 
bring  the  life  of  the  Old  and  the  New  World 
face  to  face,  by  an  accurate  comparison  of  their 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   255 

various  types  of  organization.  We  should  begin 
with  man,  of  course;  institute  a  large  and  exact 
comparison  between  the  development  of  la 
•pianta  umana,  as  Alfieri  called  it,  in  different 
sections  of  each  country, in  the  different  callings, 
at  different  ages,  estimating  height,  weight, 
force  by  the  dynamometer  and  the  spirometer, 
and  finishing  off  with  a  series  of  typical  photo- 
graphs, giving  the  principal  national  physiogno- 
mies. Mr.  Hutchinson  has  given  us  some  ex- 
cellent English  data  to  begin  with. 

Then  I  would  follow  this  up  by  contrasting 
the  various  parallel  forms  of  life  in  the  two  con- 
tinents. Our  naturalists  have  often  referred  to 
this  incidentally  or  expressly;  but  the  animus  of 
nature  in  the  two  half-globes  of  the  planet  is  so 
momentous  a  point  of  interest  to  our  race,  that 
it  should  be  made  a  subject  of  express  and  elab- 
orate study.  Go  out  with  me  into  that  walk 
which  we  call  the  Mall, and  look  at  the  English 
and  American  elm.  The  American  elm  is  tall, 
graceful,  slender-sprayed,  and  drooping,  as  if 
from  languor.  The  English  elm  is  compact, 
robust,  holds  its  branches  up,  and  carries  its 
leaves  for  weeks  longer  than  .  our  own  native 
tree. 

Is  this  typical  of  the  creative  force  on  the  two 
sides  of  the  ocean,  or  not  ?  Nothing  but  a  careful 
comparison  through  the  whole  realm  of  life  can 
answer  this  question. 

There  is  a  parallelism  without  identity  in  the 
animal  and  vegetable  life  of  the  two  continents, 
which  favors  the  task  of  comparison  in  an  ex- 
traordinary manner.  Just  as  we  have  two  trees 


256   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

alike  in  many  ways,  yet  not  the  same,  both  elms, 
yet  easily  distinguishable,  just  so  we  have  a 
complete  flora  and  a  fauna,  which,  parting  from 
the  same  ideal,  embody  it  with  various  modifi- 
cations. Incentive  power  is  the  only  quality  of 
which  the  Creative  Intelligence  seems  to  be 
economical;  just  as  with  our  largest  human 
minds,  that  is  the  divinest  of  faculties,  and  the 
one  that  most  exhausts  the  mind  which  exer- 
cises it.  As  the  same  patterns  have  very  com- 
monly been  followed,  we  can  see  which  is 
worked  out  in  the  largest  spirit,  and  determine 
the  exact  limitations  under  which  the  Creator 
places  the  movement  of  life  in  all  its  manifesta- 
tions in  either  locality.  We  should  find  our- 
selves in  a  very  false  position,  if  it  should  prove 
that  Anglo-Saxons  can't  live  here,  but  die  out, 
if  not  kept  up  by  fresh  supplies, as  Dr.  Knox  and 
other  more  or  less  wise  persons  have  maintained. 
It  may  turn  out  in  the  other  way,  as  I  have 
heard  one  of  our  literary  celebrities  argue, — and 
though  I  took  the  other  side,  I  liked  his  best, — 
that  the  American  is  the  Englishman  reinforced. 

Will  you  walk  out  and  look  at  those  elms  with 
me  after  breakfast? — I  said  to  the  school  mis- 
tress. 

[I  am  not  going  to  tell  lies  about  it,  and  say 
that  she  blushed, — as  I  suppose  she  ought  to 
have  done  at  such  a  tremendous  piece  of  gallan- 
try as  that  was  for  our  boarding  house.  On  the 
contrary,  she  turned  a  little  pale, — but  smiled 
brightly  and  said, — Yes,  with  pleasure,  but  she 
must  walk  towards  her  school.  She  went  for 
her  bonnet.  The  old  gentleman  opposite  fol- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   257 

lowed  her  with  his  eyes,  and  said  he  wished  he 
was  a  young  fellow.  Presently  she  came  down, 
looking  very  pretty  in  her  half-mourning  bon- 
net, and  carrying  a  school-book  in  her  hand.] 

MY  FIRST  WALK  WITH  THE    SCHOOLMISTRESS. 

This  is  the  shortest  way, — she  said,  as  we 
came  to  a  corner. — Then  we  won't  take  it, — said 
I. — The  schoolmistress  laughed  a  little, and  said 
she  was  ten  minutes  early,  so  she  could  go 
around. 

We  walked  around  Mr.  Paddock's  row  of 
English  elms.  The  gray  squirrels  were  out 
looking  for  their  breakfasts,  and  one  of  them 
came  towards  us  in  light,  soft,  intermittent 
leaps,  until  he  was  close  to  the  rail  of  the  burial 
ground.  He  was  on  a  grave  with  a  broad  blue 
slate-stone  at  its  head,  and  a  shrub  growing  on 
it.  The  stone  said  this  was  the  grave  of  a  young 
man  who  was  the  son  of  an  Honorable  gentleman, 
and  who  died  a  hundred  years  ago  and  more. 
Oh,  yes,  died, — with  a  small  triangular  mark  in 
one  breast,  and  another  smaller  opposite,  in  his 
back,  where  another  young  man's  rapier  had 
slid  through  his  body;  and  so  he  lay  down  out 
there  on  the  Common,  and  was  found  cold  the 
next  morning,  with  the  night-dews  and  the 
death-dews  mingled  on  his  forehead. 

Let  us  have  one  look  at  poor  Benjamin's 
grave, — said  I. — His  bones  lie  where  his  body 
was  laid  so  long  ago,  and  where  the  stone  says 
they  lie, — which  is  more  than  can  be  said  of 
most  of  the  tenants  of  this  and  several  other 
burial-grounds. 


258   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

[The  most  accursed  act  of  vandalism  ever 
committed  within  my  knowledge  was  the  up- 
rooting of  the  ancient  gravestones  in  three,  at 
least,  of  our  city  burial-grounds,  and  one,  at 
least,  just  outside  the  city,  and  planting  them 
in  rows  to  suit  the  taste  for  symmetry  of  the 
perpetrators.  Many  years  ago,  when  this  dis- 
graceful process  was  going  on  under  my  eyes, 
I  addressed  an  indignant  remonstrance  to  a  lead- 
ing journal.  I  suppose  it  was  deficient  in  liter- 
ary elegance,  or  too  warm  in  its  language;  for 
no  notice  was  taken  of  it,  and  the  hyena-horror 
was  allowed  to  complete  itself  in  the  face  of  day- 
light. I  have  never  got  over  it.  The  bones  of 
my  own  ancestors,  being  entombed,  lie  beneath 
their  own  tablet;  but  the  upright  stones  have 
been  shuffled  about  like  chessmen,  and  nothing 
short  of  the  Day  of  Judgment  will  tell  whose 
dust  lies  beneath  any  of  these  records,  meant  by 
affection  to  mark  one  small  spot  as  sacred  to 
some  cherished  memory.  Shame!  shame! 
shame! — that  is  all  I  can  say.  It  was  on  public 
thoroughfares,  under  the  eye  of  authority,  that 
this  infamy  was  enacted.  The  red  Indians 
would  have  known  better;  the  select-men  of  an 
African  kraal-village  would  have  had  more  re- 
spect for  their  ancestors.  I  should  like  to  see 
the  gravestones  which  have  been  disturbed  all 
removed,  and  the  ground  leveled,  leaving  the 
flat  tombstones;  epitaphs  were  never  famous  for 
truth,  but  the  old  reproach  of  "Here  lies1'1  never 
had  such  a  wholesome  illustration  as  in  these 
outraged  burial  places,  where  the  stone  does  lie 
above,  and  the  bones  do  not  lie  beneath.] 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  259 

Stop  before  we  turn  awa}',  and  breathe  a 
woman's  sigh  over  poor  Benjamin's  dust.  Love 
killed  him,  I  think.  Twenty  years  old,  and  out 
there  fighting  another  young  fellow  on  the  com- 
mon,in  the  cool  of  that  old  July  evening; — yes, 
there  must  have  been  love  at  the  bottom  of  it. 

The  schoolmistress  dropped  a  rosebud  she  had 
in  her  hand  through  the  rails,  upon  the  grave  of 
Benjamin  Woodbridge.  That  was  all  her  com- 
ment upon  what  I  told  her. — How  women  love 
Love!  said  I; — but  she  did  not  speak. 

We  came  opposite  the  head  of  a  place  or  court 
running  eastward  from  the  main  street. — Look 
down  there, — I  said, — my  friend,  the  Professor, 
lived  in  that  house,  at  the  left  hand,  next  the 
further  corner,  for  years  and  }'ears.  He  died 
out  of  it,  the  other  day. — Died? — said  the 
schoolmistress. — Certainly, — said  I. — We  die 
out  of  houses,  just  as  we  die  out  of  our  bodies. 
A  commercial  smash  kills  a  hundred  men's  homes 
for  them,  as  a  railroad  crash  kills  their  mortal 
frames  and  drives  out  the  immortal  tenants.  Men 
sicken  of  houses  until  at  last  they  quit  them,  as 
the  soul  leaves  its  body  when  it  is  tired  of  its  in- 
firmities. The  body  has  been  called  "the  house 
we  live  in ;"  the  house  is  quite  as  much  the  body 
we  live  in.  "  Shall  I  tell  you  some  things  the 
Professor  said  the  other  day? — Do! — said  the 
schoolmistress. 

A  man's  body, — said  the  Professor, — is  what- 
ever is  occupied  by  his  will  and  his  sensibility. 
The  small  room  down  there,  where  I  wrote  those 
papers  you  remember  reading,  was  much  more 
a  part  of  my  body  than  a  paralytic's  senseless 
and  motionless  arm  or  leg  is  of  his. 


26O   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

The  soul  of  a  man  has  a  series  of  concentric 
envelopes  around  it,  like  the  core  of  an  onion, 
or  the  innermost  of  a  nest  of  boxes.  First  he 
has  his  natural  garment  of  flesh  and  blood. 
Then,  his  artificial  integuments,  with  their  true 
skin  of  solid  stuffs,  their  cuticle  of  lighter 
tissues,  and  their  variously  tinted  pigments. 
Thirdly,  his  domicile,  be  it  a  single  chamber 
or  a  stately  mansion.  And  then,  the  whole  vis- 
ible world,  in  which  Time  buttons  him  up  as  in 
a  loose  outside  wrapper. 

You  shall  observe, — the  Professor  said, — for, 
like  Mr.  John  Hunter  and  other  great  men,  he 
brings  in  that  shall  with  great  effect  sometimes, 
— you  shall  observe  that  a  man's  clothing  or 
series  of  envelopes  after  a  certain  time  mould 
themselves  upon  his  individual  nature.  We 
know  this  of  our  hats,  and  are  always  reminded 
of  it  when  we  happen  to  put  them  on  wrong  side 
foremost.  We  soon  find  that  the  beaver  is  a 
hollow  cast  of  the  skull,  with  all  its  irregular 
bumps  and  depressions.  Just  so  all  that  clothes 
a  man,  even  to  the  blue  sky  which  caps  his 
head, — a  little  loosely, — shapes  itself  to  fit  each 
particular  being  beneath  it.  Farmers,  sailors, 
astronomers,  poets,  lovers, condemned  criminals, 
all  find  it  different,  according  to  the  eyes  with 
which  they  severally  look. 

But  our  houses  shape  themselves  palpably  on 
our  inner  and  outer  natures.  See  a  householder 
breaking  up  and  you  will  be  sure  of  it.  There 
is  a  shell-fish  which  builds  all  manner  of  smaller 
shells  into  the  walls  of  its  own.  A  house  is 
never  a  home  until  we  have  crusted  it  with  the 


THE    AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE    26 1 

spoils  of  a  hundred  lives  besides  those  of  our 
own  past.  See  what  these  are,  and  you  can  tell 
what  the  occupant  is. 

I  had  no  idea, — said  the  Professor, — until  I 
pulled  up  my  domestic  establishment  the  other 
day,  what  an  enormous  quantity  of  roots  I  had 
been  making  the  years  I  was  planted  there. 
Why,  there  wasn't  a  nook  or  a  corner  that  some 
fiber  had  not  worked  its  way  into;  and  when  I 
gave  the  last  wrench,  each  of  them  seemed  to 
shriek  like  a  mandrake,  as  it  broke  its  hold  and 
came  away. 

There  is  nothing  that  happens,  you  know, 
which  must  not  inevitably,  and  which  does  not 
actually,  photograph  itself  in  every  conceivable 
aspect  and  in  all  dimensions.  The  infinite  gal- 
leries of  the  Past  await  but  one  brief  process 
and  all  their  pictures  will  be  called  out  and  fixed 
forever.  We  had  a  'curious  illustration  of  the 
great  fact  on  a  very  humble  scale.  When  a 
certain  book-case,  long  standing  in  one  place, 
for  which  it  was  built,  was  removed,  there  was 
the  exact  image  on  the  wall  of  the  whole, and  of 
many  of  its  portions.  But  in  the  midst  of  this 
picture  was  another, — the  precise  outline  of  a 
map  which  hung  on  the  wall  before  the  book- 
case was  built.  We  had  all  forgotten  everything 
about  the  map  until  we  saw  its  photograph  on 
the  wall.  Then  we  remembered  it,  as  some  day 
or  other  we  may  remember  a  sin  which  has  been 
built  over  and  covered  up,  when  this  lower  uni- 
verse is  pulled  away  from  the  wall  of  Infinity, 
where  the  wrong-doing  stands,  self-recorded. 

The  professor  lived  in  that  house  a  long  time 


262   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

— not  twenty  years,  but  pretty  near  it.  When 
he  entered  that  door,  two  shadows  glided  over 
the  threshold;  five  lingered  in  the  door-way 
when  he  passed  through  it  for  the  last  time, — 
and  one  of  the  shadows  was  claimed  by  its 
owner  to  be  longer  than  his  own.  What  changes 
he  saw  in  that  quiet  place!  Death  rained 
through  every  roof  but  his;  children  came  into 
life,  grew  to  maturity;  wedded,  faded  away, 
threw  themselves  away;  the  whole  drama  of  life 
was  played  in  that  stock-company's  theater  of  a 
dozen  houses,  one  of  which  was  his,  and  no 
deep  sorrow  or  severe  calamity  ever  entered  his 
dwelling.  Peace  be  to  those  walls  forever, — the 
Professor  said, — for  the  many  pleasant  years  he 
has  passed  within  them. 

The  Professor  has  a  friend,  now  living  at  a 
distance,  who  has  been  with  him  in  many  of  his 
changes  of  place,  and  who  follows  him  in  imag- 
ination with  tender  interest  wherever  he  goes. 
— In  that  little  court,  where  he  lived  in  gay 
loneliness  so  long, — 

— in  his  autumnal  sojourn  by  the  Connecticut, 
where  it  comes  loitering  down  from  its  mountain 
fastnesses  like  a  great  lord,  swallowing  up  the 
small  proprietary  rivulets  very  quietly  as  it  goes, 
until  it  gets  proud  and  swollen  and  wantons  in 
huge  luxurious  oxbows  about  the  fair  North- 
ampton meadows,  and  at  last  overflows  the  old- 
est inhabitant's  memory  in  profligate  freshets  at 
Hartford  and  all  along  its  lower  shores, — up  in 
that  caravansary  on  the  banks  of  the  stream 
where  Ledyard  launched  his  log  canoe,  and  the 
jovial  old  Colonel  used  to  lead  the  commence- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE      263 

ment  processions, — where  blue  Ascutney  looked 
down  from  the  far  distance,  and  the  hills  of 
Beulah,  as  the  Professor  always  called  them, 
rolled  up  the  opposite  horizon  in  soft  climbing 
masses,  so  suggestive  of  the  Pilgrim's  Heaven- 
ward Path  that  he  used  to  look  through  his  old 
"Dollond"  to  see  if  the  Shining  Ones  were  not 
within  range  of  sight, — sweet  visions, sweetest  in 
those  Sunday  walks  that  carried  them  by  the 
peaceful  common,  through  the  solemn  village 
lying  in  cataleptic  stillness  under  th  shadows  of 
the  rod  of  Moses,  to  the  terminus  of  their  harm- 
less stroll, — the  patulous  fage,  in  the  Professor's 
classic  dialect, — the  spreading  beech,  in  more 
familar  phrase,  —  [stop  and  breathe  here  a 
moment,  for  the  sentence  is  not  done  yet,  and 
we  have  another  long  journey  before  us.] 

— and  again  once  more  up  among  those  other 
hills  that  shut  in  the  amber-flowing  Housatonic, 
— dark  stream,  but  clear,  like  the  lucid  orbs 
that  shine  beneath  the  lids  of  auburn-haired, 
sherry-wine-eyed  demi-blondes, — in  the  home 
overlooking  the  winding  stream  and  the  smooth, 
flat  meadow;  looked  down  upon  by  wild  hills, 
where  the  tracks  of  bears  and  catamounts  may 
yet  sometimes  be  seen  upon  the  winter  snow; 
facing  the  twin  summits  which  rise  in  the  far 
North,  the  highest  waves  of  the  great  land  storm 
in  all  this  billowy  region, — suggestive  to  mad 
fancies  of  the  breasts  of  a  half-buried  Titaness, 
stretched  out  by  a  stray  thunder-bolt  and  hastily 
hidden  away  beneath  the  leaves  of  the  forest, — 
in  that  home  where  seven  blessed  summers 
were  passed,  which  stand  in  memory  like  the 


264     THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

seven  golden  candlesticks   in  the  beatific  vision 
of  the  holy  dreamer, — 

— in  that  modest  dwelling  we  were  just  look- 
ing at,  not  glorious,  yet  not  unlovely  in  the 
youth  of  its  drab  and  mahogany, — full  of  great 
and  little  boys'  playthings  from  top  to  bottom, 
— in  all  these  summer  or  winter  nests,  he  was 
always  at  home  and  always  welcome. 

This  long  articulated  sigh  of  reminiscences, 
— this  calenture  which  shows  me  the  maple- 
shadowed  plains  of  Berkshire, and  the  mountain- 
circled  green  of  Grafton  beneath  the  salt  waves 
that  come  feeling  their  way  along  the  wall  at 
my  feet, restless  and  soft-touching  as  blind  men's 
busy  fingers, — is  for  that  friend  of  mine  who 
looks  into  the  waters  of  the  Patapsco  and  sees 
beneath  them  the  same  visions  that  paint  them- 
selves for  me  in  the  green  depths  of  the 
Charles. 

Did  I  talk  all  this  off  to  the  schoolmistress? — 
Why,  no — of  course  not.  I  have  been  talking 
with  you,  the  reader,  for  the  last  ten  minutes. 
You  don't  think  I  should  expect  any  woman  to 
listen  to  such  a  sentence  as  that  long  one,  with- 
out giving  her  a  chance  to  put  in  a  word? 

What  did  I  say  to  the  schoolmistress? — Per- 
mit me  one  moment.  I  don't  doubt  your  deli- 
cacy and  good-breeding;  but  in  this  particular 
case,  as  I  was  allowed  the  privilege  of  walking 
alone  with  a  very  interesting  young  woman, you 
must  allow  me  to  remark,  in  the  classic  version 
of  a  familiar  phrase,  used  by  our  Master  Benja- 
min Franklin,  it  is  nuttum  tui  negotii. 

When  the  school  mistress  and  I   reached    the 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   265 

schoolroom  door,  the  damask  roses  I  spoke  of 
were  so  much  heightened  in  color  by  exercise 
that  I  felt  sure  it  would  be  useful  to  her  to  take 
a  stroll  like  this  every  morning,  and  made  up 
my  mind  I  would  ask  her  to  let  me  join  her 
again. 

EXTRACTS  FROM  MY  PRIVATE  JOURNAL. 

( To  be  burned  unread. ) 

I  am  afraid  I  have  been  a  fool;  for  I  have 
told  as  much  of  myself  to  this  young  person  as 
if  she  were  of  that  ripe  and  discreet  age  which 
invites  confidence  and  expansive  utterance.  I 
have  been  low  spirited  and  listless,  lately, — it  is 
coffee,  I  think, — (I  observe  that  which  is  bought 
ready  ground  never  affects  the  head), — and  I 
notice  that  I  tell  my  secrets  too  easily  when  I 
am  downhearted. 

There  are  inscriptions  on  our  hearts,  which, 
like  that  on  Dighton  Rock,  are  never  to  be  seen 
except  at  dead-low  tide. 

There  is  a  woman's  footstep  on  the  sand  at 
the  side  of  my  deepest  ocean-buried  inscription. 

— Oh,  no,  no !  a  thousand  times,  no !  Yet,  what 
is  this  which  has  been  shaping  itself  in  my  soul? 
— is  it  a  thought? — is  it  a  dream? — is  it  a.  pas- 
sion?— Then  I  know  what  comes  next. 

The  asylum  stood  on  a  bright  and  breezy  hill; 
those  glazed  corridors  are  pleasant  to  walk  in, 
in  bad  weather.  But  there  are  iron  bars  to  all 
the  windows.  When  it  is  fair,  some  of  us  can 
stroll  outside  that  very  high  fence.  But  I  never 
see  much  life  in  the  groups  I  sometimes  meet; 


266   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

and  then  the  careful  man  watches  them  so 
closely!  How  I  remember  that  sad  company 
I  used  to  pass  on  fina  mornings,  when  I  was 
a  schoolboy! — B.,  with  his  arms  full  of  yellow 
weeds, — ore  from  the  gold  mines  which  he  dis- 
covered long  before  we  heard  of  California, — 
Y.,  born  to  millions,  crazed  by  too  much  plum- 
cake  (the  boys  said),  dogged, explosive, — made 
a  Polyphemus  of  my  weak-eyed  schoolmaster 
by  a  vicious  flirt  with  a  stick, — (the  multi-mil- 
lionaires sent  him  a  trifle, it  was  said,  to  buy  an- 
other eye  with ;  but  boys  are  jealous  of  rich 
folks,  and  I  don't  doubt  the  good  people  made 
him  easy  for  life), — how  I  remember  them  all! 
I  recollect,  as  all  do,  the  story  of  the  Hall  of 
Eblis,  in  "Vathek,"and  how  each  shape,  as  it 
lifted  its  hand  from  its  breast,  showed  its  heart, 
— a  burning  coal.  The  real  Hall  of  Eblis  stands 
on  yonder  summit.  Go  there  on  the  next  visit- 
ing day,  and  ask  that  figure  crouched  in  the 
corner,  huddled  up  like  those  Indian  mummies 
and  skeletons  found  buried  in  the  sitting  post- 
ure, to  lift  its  hand, — look  upon  its  heart,  and 
behold,  not  fire,  but  ashes. — No,  I  must  not 
think  of  such  an  ending!  Dying  would  be.  a 
much  more  gentlemanly  way  of  meeting  the 
difficulty.  Make  a  will  and  leave  her  a  house 
or  two  and  some  stocks, and  other  little  financial 
conveniences  to  take  away  her  necessity  for 
keeping  school. — I  wonder  what  nice  young 
man's  feet  would  be  in  my  French  slippers  be- 
fore six  months  were  over!  Well,  what  then? 
If  a  man  really  loves  a  woman,  of  course  he 
wouldn't  marry  her  for  the  world,  if  he  were 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   267 

not  quite  sure  that  he  was  the  best   person    that 
she  could  by  any  possibility  marry. 

It  is  odd  enough  to  read  over  what  I  have 
just  been  writing. — It  is  the  merest  fancy  that 
ever  was  in  the  world.  I  shall  never  be  mar- 
ried. She  will;  and  if  she  is  as  pleasant  as  she 
has  been  so  far,  I  will  give  her  a  silver  tea-set, 
and  go  and  take  tea  with  her  and  her  husband, 
sometimes.  No  coffee,  I  hope,  though, — it  de- 
presses me  sadly.  I  feel  very  miserably ;  they 
must  have  been  grinding  it  at  home. — Another 
morning  walk  will  be  good  for  me,  and  I  don't 
doubt  the  schoolmistress  will  be  glad  of  a  little 
fresh  air  before  school. 

The  throbbing  flushes  of  the  poetical  inter- 
mittent have  been  coming  over  me  from  time  to 
time  of  late.  Did  you  ever  see  that  electrical 
experiment  which  consists  in  passing  a  flash 
through  letters  cf  gold-leaf  in  a  darkened  room, 
whereupon  some  name  or  legend  springs  out  of 
the  darkness  in  characters  of  fire? 

There  are  songs  all  written  out  in  my  soul, 
which  I  could  read,  if  the  flash  might  but  pass 
through  them, — but  the  fire  must  come  down 
from  heaven.  Ah !  but  what  if  the  stormy  nim- 
bus of  youthful  passion  has  blown  by,  and  one 
asks  for  lightning  from  the  ragged  cirrus  of  dis- 
solving aspirations,  or  the  silvered  cumulus  of 
sluggish  satiety?  I  will  call  on  her  whom  the 
dead  poets  believed  in,  whom  living  ones  no 
longer  worship, — the  immortal  maid,  who,  name 
her  what  you  will, — Goddess,  Muse,  Spirit  of 
Beauty, — sits  by  the  pillow  of  every  youthful 


268  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

poet  and  bends  over  his  pale  forehead  until  her 
tresses  lie  upon  his  cheek  and  rain  their  gold 
into  his  dreams. 


MUSA. 

O  my  lost  Beauty  !— hast  thou  folded  quite 

Thy  wings  of  morning  light 

Beyond  those  iron  gates 

Where  Life  crowds  hurrying  to  the  haggard  Fates, 
And  age  upon  his  mound  of  ashes  waits 

To  chill  our  fiery  dreams, 
Hot  from  the  heart  of  youth  plunged  in  his  icy  streams? 

Leave  me  not  fading  in  these  weeds  of  care, 

Whose  flowers  are  silvered  hair! 

Have  I  not  loved  thee  long, 

Though  my  young  lips  have  often  done  thee  wrong 
And  vexed  thy  heaven-tuned  ear  with  careless  song? 

Ah,  wilt  thou  yet  return, 
Bearing  thy  rose-hued  torch,  and  bid  thine  altar  burn? 

Come  to  me  !— I  will  flood  thy  silent  shrine 

With  my  soul's  sacred  wine, 

And  heap  thy  marble  floors 

As  the  wild  spice-trees  waste  their  fragrant  stores 
In  leafy  islands  walled  with  madrepores 

And  lapped  in  Orient  seas, 
When  all  their  feathery  palms  toss, plume-like,  in  the  breeze. 

Come  to  me ! — thou  shalt  feed  on  honeyed  words, 

Sweeter  than  song  of  birds ; — 

No  wailing  bulbul's  throat, 
No  melting  dulcimer's  melodious  note, 
When  o'er  the  midnight  wave  its  murmurs  float, 

Thy  ravished  sense  might  soothe 
With  flow  so  liquid-soft,  with  strain  so  velvet-smooth. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   269 

Thou  shall  be  decked  with  jewels,  like  a  queen, 

Sought  in  those  bowers  of  green, 

Where  loop  the  clustered  vines 
And  the  close-clinging  dulcamara  twines, — 
Pure  pearls  of  Maydew  where  the  moonlight  shines, 

And  summer's  fruited  gems, 
And  coral  pendants  shorn  from  Autumn's  berried  stems. 

Sit  by  me  drifting  on  the  sleepy  waves, — 

Or  stretched  by  grass-grown  graves, 

Whose  gray,  high-shouldered  stones, 
Carved  with  old  names  life's  time-worn  roll  disowns, 
Lean,  lichen-spotted,  o'er  the  crumbled  bones 

Still  slumbering  where  they  lay 
While  the  sad  pilgrim  watched  to  scare  the  wolf  away. 

Spread  o'er  my  couch  thy  visionary  wing  I 

Still  let  me  dream  and  sing, — 

Dream  of  that  winding  shore 

Where  scarlet  cardinals  bloom, — for  me  no  more, — 
The  stream  with  heaven  beneath  its  liquid  floor, 

And  clustering  nenuphars 
Sprinkling  its  mirrored  blue  like  golden-chaliced  stars  ! 

Come  while  their  balms  the  linden-blossoms  shed  ! 

Come  while  the  rose  is  red, — 

While  blue-eyed  summer  smiles 
O'er  the  green  ripples  round  yon  sunken  piles 
Washed  by  the  moon-wave  warm  from  Indian  isles, 

And  on  the  sultry  air 
The  chestnuts  spread  their  palms  like  holy  men  in  prayer! 

Oh  for  the  burning  lips  to  fire  my  brain 

With  thrills  of  wild  sweet  pain  !— 

On  life's  autumnal  blast 
Like  shriveled  leaves,  youth's  passion-flowers  are  cast, — 

Once  loving  thee,  we  love  thee  to  the  last ! — 

Behold  thy  new-decked  shrine, 

And  hear  once  more  the  voice  that  breathed,  "Forever 
thine  !" 


270   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 
XL 

[The  company  looked  a  little  flustered  one 
morning  when  I  came  in, — so  much  so,  that  I 
inquired  of  my  neighbor,  the  divinity-student, 
what  had  been  going  on.  It  appears  that  the 
young  fellow  whom  they  call  John  had  taken 
advantage  of  my  being  a  little  late  (I  having 
been  rather  longer  than  usual  dressing  that 
morning)  to  circulate  several  questions  involving 
a  quibble  or  play  upon  words, — in  short,  con- 
taining that  indignity  to  the  human  understand- 
ing, condemned  in  the  passages  from  the  dis- 
tinguished moralist  of  the  last  century  and  the 
illustrious  historian  of  the  present, which  I  cited 
on  a  former  occasion,  and  known  as  a  pun. 
After  breakfast,  one  of  the  boarders  handed  me 
a  small  roll  of  paper  containing  some  of  the 
questions  and  their  answers.  I  subjoin  two  or 
three  of  them,  to  show  what  a  tendency  there  is 
to  frivolity  and  meaningless  talk  in  young  per- 
sons of  a  certain  sort,  when  not  restrained  by 
the  presence  of  more  reflective  natures.  It  was 
asked,  "Why  tertian  and  quartan  fevers  were 
like  certain  short-lived  insects."  Some  inter- 
esting physiological  relation  would  be  naturally 
suggested.  The  inquirer  blushes  to  find  that 
the  answer  is  in  the  paltry  equivocation,  that" 
they  skip  a  day  or  two. — "Why  an  Englishman 
must  go  to  the  continent  to  weaken  his  grog  or 
punch."  The  answer  proves  to  have  no  relation 
whatever  to  the  temperance  movement,  as  no 
better  reason  is  given  than  that  island — (or,as  it 
is  absurdly  written,  tie  and)  water  won't  mix. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   27! 

But  when  I  came  to  the  next  question  and  its  an- 
swer, I  felt  that  patience  ceased  to  be  a  virtue. 
"Why  an  onion  is  like  a  piano"  is  a  query  that  a 
person  of  sensibility  would  be  slow  to  propose; 
but  that  in  an  educated  community  an  individual 
could  be  found  to  answer  it  in  these  words, — 
"Because  it  smell  odious,"  quasi,  it's  melodious, 
— is  not  credible,  but  too  true.  I  can  show  you 
the  paper. 

Dear  reader,  I  beg  your  pardon  for  repeating 
such  things.  I  know  most  conversations  re- 
ported in  books  are  altogether  above  such  trivial 
details,  but  folly  will  come  up  at  every  table  as 
surely  as  purslain  andchickweed  and  sorrel  will 
come  up  in  gardens.  This  young  fellow  ought 
to  have  talked  philosophy,!  know  perfectly  well; 
but  he  didn't, — he  made  jokes.] 

I  am  willing, — I  said, — to  exercise  your 
ingenuity  in  a  rational  and  contemplative 
manner. — No,  I  do  not  prescribe  certain 
forms  of  philosophical  speculation  which 
involve  an  approach  to  the  absurd  or 
ludicrous,  such  as  you  may  find, for  example,  in 
the  folio  of  the  Reverend  Father  Thomas  San- 
chez, in  his  famous  tractate,  "DeSancto  Matri- 
monio."  I  will  therefore  turn  this  levity  of  yours 
to  profit  by  reading  you  a  rhymed  problem, 
wrought  out  by  my  friend,  the  Professor. 


272      THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 
THE    DEACON'S     MASTERPIECE, 

OR  THE  WONDERFUL  "ONE-HOSS-SHAY." 
A  Logical  Story. 

Have  you  heard  of  the  wonderful  one-hoss-shay, 

That  was  built  in  such  a  logical  way 

It  ran  a  hundred  years  to  a  day, 

And  then,  of  a  sudden,  it — ah,  but  stay, 

I'll  tell  you  what  happened  without  delay, 

Scaring  the  parson  into  fits, 

Frightening  people  out  of  their  wits, — 

Have  you  ever  heard  of  that,  I  say  ? 

Seventeen  hundred  and  fifty-five, 
Georgius  Secundus  was  then  alive, — 
Snuffy  old  drone  from  the  German  hive  ! 
That  was  the  year  when  Lisbon-town 
Saw  the  earth  open  and  gulp  her  down, 
And  Braddock's  army  was  done  so  brown, 
Left  without  a  scalp  to  its  crown. 
It  was  on  the  terrible  Earthquake  day 
That  the  Deacon  finished  the  one-boss-shay. 

Now  in  building  of  chaises,  I  tell  you  what, 

There  is  always  somewhere  a  weakest  spot, — 

In  hub,  tire,  felloe,  in  spring  or  thill, 

In  panel  or  cross-bar,  or  floor  or  sill, 

In  screw,  bolt,  thoroughbrace, — lurking  still, 

Find  it  somewhere  you  must  and  will, — 

Above  or  below,  or  within  or  without, — 

And  that's  the  reason,  beyond  a  doubt, 

A  chaise  breaks  down,  but  doesn't  -wear  out. 

But  the  Deacon  swore  (as  Deacons  do, 
With  an  "I  dew  vum"  or  an  "I  tell  yeou,") 
He  would  build  one  shay  to  beat  the  taown 
N'  the  keounty  'n'  all  the  kentry  raoun'; 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  273 

It  should  be  so  built  that  it  couldri1  break  daown; 
— "Fur,"  said  the  Deacon,  " 't's  mighty  plain 
That  the  weakes'  place  mus'  stan'  the  strain; 
'N  the  way  t'  fix  it,  uz  I  maintain, 

Is  only  jest 
To  make  that  place  uz  strong  uz  the  rest." 

So  the  Deacon  inquired  of  the  village  folk 

Where  he  could  find  the  strongest  oak, 

That  couldn't  be  split,  nor  bent,  nor  broke. — 

That  was  for  spokes  and  floors  and  sills ; 

He  sent  for  lancewood  to  make  the  thills  ; 

The  crossbars  were  ash,  from  the  straightest  trees; 

The  panels  of  white-wood,  that  cuts  like  cheese, 

But  lasts  like  iron  for  things  like  these; 

The  hubs  of  logs  from  the  "Settler's  ellum," 

Last  of  its  timber, — they  couldn't  sell  'em. 

Never  an  axe  had  seen  their  chips, 

And  the  wedges  flew  from  between  their  lips, 

Their  blunt  ends  frizzled  like  celery-tips  ; 

Step  and  prop-iron,  bolt  and  screw, 

Spring,  tire,  axle,  and  linchpin  too, 

Steel  of  the  finest,  bright  and  blue  ; 

Thoroughbrace  bison-skin,   thick  and  wide ; 

Boot,  top,  dasher,  from  tough  old  hide 

Found  in  the  pit  when  the  tanner  died. 

That  was  the  way  he  "put  her  through.''— 

"There  !"  said  the  Deacon,  "  naow  she'll  dew  1" 

Do!  I  tell  you,  I  rather  guess 

She  was  a  wonder  and  nothing  less  ! 

Colts  grew  horses,  beards  turned  gray, 

Deacon  and  Deaconess  dropped  away, 

Children  and  grand-children — where  were  they? 

But  there  stood  the  stout  old  one-hoss-shay 

As  freh  s  on  Lisbon -Earthquake-day 

EiTEGsaN  HUNDRED; — it  came  and  found 
The  Deacon's  Masterpiece  strong  and  sound. 


274   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Eighteen  hundred  increased  by  ten; — 

"Hahnsum  kerridge"  they  called  it  then. 

Eighteen  hundred  and  twenty  came; — 

Running  as  usual ;  much  the  same. 

Thirty  and  forty  at  last  arrive. 

And  then  came  fifty,  and  FIFTY-FIVE. 

Little  of  all  we  value  here 

Wakes  on  the  morn  of  its  hundredth  year 

Without  both  feeling  and  looking  queer. 

In  fact,  there's  nothing  that  keeps  its  youth, 

So  far  as  I  know,  but  a  tree  and  truth. 

(This  is  a  moral  that  runs  at  large; 

Take  it. — You're  welcome. — No  extra  charge.) 

FIRST  OF  NOVEMBER,— the  Earthquake  day, — 
There  are  traces  of  age  in  the  one-hoss-shay, 
A  general  flavor  of  mild  decay, 
But  nothing  local,  as  one  may  say. 
There  couldn't  be,  — for  the  Deacon's  art 
Has  made  it  so  like  in  every  part 
That  there  wasn't  a  chance  for  one  to  start. 
For  the  wheels  were  just  as  strong  as  the  thills, 
And  the  floors  were  just  as  strong  as  the  sills, 
And  the  panels  just  as  strong  as  the  floor, 
And  the  whippletree  neither  less  nor  more, 
And  the  back  crossbar  as  strong  as  the  fore, 
And  spring  and  axle  and  hub  encore. 
And  yet,  as  a  whole,  it  is  past  a  doubt 
In  another  hour  it  will  be  -worn  out! 

First  of  November,  'Fifty-five  ! 
This  morning  the  parson  takes  a  drive. 
Now,  small  boys,  get  out  of  the  way  ! 
Here  comes  the  wonderful  one-hoss-shay, 
Drawn  by  a  rat-tailed,  ewe-necked  bay. 
"Huddup!"  said  the  parson  —Off  went  they. 

The  parson  was  working  his  Sunday's  text, — 
Had  got  to  fifthly,  and  stopped  perplexed 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   275 

At  what  the — Moses — was  coming  next. 

All  at  once  the  horse  stood  still, 

Close  by  the  meet'n'-house  on  the  hill. 

— First  a  shiver  aud  then  a  thrill, 

Then  something  decidedly  like  a  spill,— 

And  the  parson  was  sitting  upon  a  rock, 

At  half-past  nine  by  the  meet'n'-house  clock,^ 

Just  the  hour  of  the  earthquake-shock  ! 

— What  do  you  think  the  parson  found, 

When  he  got  up  and  stared  around  ? 

The  poor  old  chaise  in  a  heap  or  mound, 

As  if  it  had  been  to  the  mill  and  ground  ! 

You  see,  of  course,  if  you're  not  a  dunce, 

How  it  went  to  pieces  all  at  once, — 

All  at  once,  and  nothing  first, — 

Just  as  bubbles  do  when  they  burst 

End  of  the  wonderful  one-hoss-shay. 
Logic  is  logic.     That's  all  I  say. 

I  think  there  is  one  habit, — I  said  to  our  com- 
pany a  day  or  two  afterwards, — worse  than  that 
of  punning.  It  is  the  gradual  substitution  of 
cant  or  flash  terms  for  words  which  truly  char- 
acterize their  objects.  I  have  known  several 
very  genteel  idiots  whose  vocabulary  had  de- 
liquesced into  some  half  dozen  expressions.  All 
things  fell  into  one  of  two  great  categories, — 
fast  or  slow.  Man's  chief  end  was  to  be  a 
brick.  When  the  great  calamities  of  life  over- 
took their  friends,  these  last  were  spoken  of  as 
being  a  good  deal  cut  up.  Nine-tenths  of  human 
existence  were  summed  up  in  the  single  word, 
bore.  These  expressions  come  to  be  the  alge- 
braic symbols  of  minds  which  have  grown  too 
weak  or  indolent  to  discriminate.  They  are  the 


276   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

blank  checks  of  intellectual  bankruptcy ; — you 
may  fill  them  up  with  what  idea  you  like;  it 
makes  no  difference,  for  there  are  no  funds  in 
the  treasury  upon  which  they  are  drawn.  Col- 
leges and  good-for-nothing  smoking  clubs  are 
the  places  where  these  conversational  fungi 
spring  up  most  luxuriantly.  Don't  think  I  un- 
dervalue the  proper  use  and  application  of  a 
cant  word  or  phrase.  It  adds  piquancy  to  con- 
versation, as  a  mushroom  does  to  a  sauce.  But 
it  is  no  better  than  a  toadstool,  odious  to  the 
sense  and  poisonous  to  the  intellect,  when  it 
spawns  itself  all  over  the  talk  of  men  and  youths 
capable  of  talking,  as  it  sometimes  does.  As 
we  hear  slang  phraseology,  it  is  commonly  the 
dishwater  from  the  washings  of  English  dandy- 
ism, schoolboy  or  full-grown,  wrung  out  of  a 
three-volume  novel  which  had  sopped  it  up,  or 
decanted  from  the  pictured  urn  of  Mr.  Verdant 
Green,  and  diluted  to  suit  the  provincial  climate. 

The  young  fellow  called  John  spoke  up  sharply 
and  said  it  was  "rum" to  hear  me  "pitchin'  into 
fellers"  for  "goin'  it  in  the  slang  line,"  when  I 
used  all  the  flash  words  myself  just  when  I 
pleased. 

I  replied  with  my  usual  forbearance. — Cer- 
tainly, to  give  up  the  Algebraic  Symbol  because 
a  or  b  is  often  a  cover  for  ideal  nihility,  would  be 
unwise.  I  have  heard  a  child  laboring  to  ex- 
press a  certain  condition,  involving  a  hitherto  un- 
described  sensation  (as  it  supposed),  all  of 
which  could  have  been  sufficiently  explained  by 
the  participle  bored.  I  have  seen  a  country 
clergyman,  with  a  one-story  intellect  and  a  one- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   277 

horse  vocabulary,  who  has  consumed  his  valua- 
ble time  (and  mine)  freely, — in  developing  an 
opinion  of  a  brother-minister's  discourse  which 
would  have  been  abundantly  characterized  by  a 
peach-down-lipped  sophomore  in  the  one 
word — slow.  Let  us  discriminate,  and  be  shy  of 
absolute  proscription.  I  am  omniver-bivorous  by 
nature  and  training.  Passing  by  such  words 
as  are  poisonous,  I  can  swallow  most  others  and 
chew  such  as  I  cannot  swallow. 

Dandies  are  not  good  foi  much,  but  they  are 
good  for  something.  They  invent  or  keep  in 
circulation  those  conversational  blank  checks  or 
counters  just  spoken  of,  which  intellectual  cap- 
italists may  sometimes  find  it  worth  their  while 
to  borrow  of  them.  They  are  useful,  too,  in 
keeping  up  the  standard  of  dress,  which, but  for 
them,  would  deteriorate,  and  become,  what 
some  old  fools  would  have  it,  a  matter  of  con- 
venience, not  of  taste  and  art.  Yes,  I  like 
dandies  well  enough, — on  one  condition. 

What  is  that,  Sir? — said  the  divinity-student. 

That  they  have  pluck.  I  find  that  lies  at  the 
bottom  of  all  true  dandyism.  A  little  boy 
dressed  up  very  fine,  who  puts  his  finger  in  his 
mouth  and  takes  to  crying,  if  other  boys  make 
fun  of  him,  looks  very  sill}7.  But  if  he  turns  red 
in  the  face  and  knotty  in  the  fists,  and  makes 
an  example  of  the  biggest  of  his  assailants,  throw- 
ing off  his  fine  -Leghorn  and  his  thickly-but- 
toned jacket,  if  necessary,  to  consummate  the 
act  of  justice,  his  small  toggery  takes  on  the 
splendors  of  the  crested  helmet  that  frightened 
Astyanax.  You  remember  that  the  Duke  said  his 


278   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

dandy  officers  were  his  best  officers.  The  "Sun- 
day blood, "the  super-superb  sartorial  equestrian 
of  our  annual  Fast-day, is  not  imposing  or  danger- 
ous. But  such  fellows  as  Brummel  and  D'Or- 
say  and  Byron  are  not  to  be  snubbed  quite  so 
easily.  Look  out  for  "la  main  de  fer  sous  le 
gant  de  velours"(which  I  printed  in  English  the 
other  day  without  quotation-marks,  thinking 
whether  any  scarabceus  criticus  would  add 
this  to  his  globe  and  roll  in  glory  with  it  into 
the  newspapers, — which  he  didn't  do  it,  in  the 
charming  pleonasm  of  the  London  language,  and 
therefore  I  claim  the  sole  merit  of  exposing  the 
same).  A  good  many  powerful  and  dangerous 
people  have  had  a  decided  dash  of  dandyism 
about  them.  There  was  Alcibiades,  the  "curled 
son  of  Clinias,"  an  accomplished  young  man, 
but  what  would  be  called  a  "swell"  in  these 
days.  There  was  Aristoteles,a  very  distinguished 
writer, of  whom  you  have  heard, — a  philosopher 
in  short,  whom  it  took  centuries  to  learn,  cen- 
turies to  unlearn,  and  is  now  going  to  take  a 
generation  or  more  to  learn  over  again.  Regu- 
lar dandy,  he  was.  So  was  Marcus  Atonius; 
and  though  he  lost  his  game,  he  pla}*ed  for  big 
stakes,  and  it  wasn't  his  dandyism  that  spoiled 
his  chance.  Petrarca  was  not  to  be  despised 
as  a  scholar  or  a  poet,  but  he  was  one  of  the 
same  sort.  So  was  Sir  Humphre}'  Davy;  so 
was  Lord  Palmerston,  formerly,  if  I  am  not  for- 
getful. Yes, — a  dandy  is  good  for  something 
as  such  ;  and  dandies  such  as  I  was  just  speaking 
of  have  rocked  this  planet  like  a  cradle, — aye, 
and  left  it  swinging  to  this  day.  Still,  if  I  were 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  279 

you,  I  wouldn't  go  to  the  tailor's  on  the  strength 
of  these  remarks,  and  run  up  a  long  bill  which 
will  render  pockets  a  superfluit}'  in  your  next 
suit.  Elegans  " nascitur,  nonfe."  A  man  is  born 
a  dandy, as  he  is  born  a  poet.  There  are  heads 
that  can't  wear  hats;  there  are  necks  that  can't 
fit  cravats;  there  are  jaws  that  can't  fill  out  col- 
lars— (Willis  touched  this  last  point  in  one  of  his 
earlier  ambrotypes,  if  I  remember  rightly ) ;  there 
are  tournures  nothing  can  humanize,  and  move- 
ments nothing  can  subdue  to  the  gracious  suavity 
or  elegant  languor  or  stately  serenity  which  be- 
long to  different  styles  of  dandyism. 

Wejare  forming  an  aristnrrary,  as  you  may 
observe,  in  this  country, — not  a  gratia-Dei,  nor 
a  jure-divino  one.— vbut  a  de-far.fa  "pppr  g*ratnm 
of  being,  which  floats  over  the  turbid  waves  of 
common  life  like  the  iridescent  film  you  may  have 
seen  spreading  over  the  water  about  our 
wharves, — very  splendid,  though  its  origin  may 
have  been  tar,  tallow,  train-oil,  or  other  such 
unctuous  commodities.  I  say,  then,  we  are 
forming  an  aristocracy;  and,  transitory  as  its 
individual  life  often  is,  it  maintains  itself  toler- 
bly,  as  a  whole.  Of  course,  money  is  its  cor- 
ner-stone. But  now  observe  this.  Money  kept 
for  two  or  three  generations  transforms  a  race 
— I  don't  mean  merely  in  manners  and  hereditary 
culture,  but  in  blood  and  bone.  Money  buys 
air  and  sunshine,  in  which  children  grow  up 
more  kindly,  of  course,  than  in  close,  back 
streets  it  buys  country-places  to  give  them 
happy  and  health}*  summers,  good  nursing, 
good  doctoring,  and  the  best  cuts  of  beef  and 
mutton.  When  the  spring  chickens  come  to 


280  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

market — I  beg  your  pardon, — that  is  not  what  I 
was  going  to  speak  of.  As  the  young  females 
of  each  successive  season  come  on,  the  finest 
specimens  among  them, other  things  being  equal, 
are  apt  to  attract  those  who  can  afford  the  ex- 
pensive luxury  of  beauty.  The  physical  charac- 
ter of  the  next  generation  rises  in  consequence. 
It  is  plain  that  certain  families  have  in  this  way 
acquired  an  elevated  type  of  face  and  figure, and 
that  in  a  small  circle  of  city-connections  one  may 
sometimes  find  models  of  both  sexes  which  one 
of  the  rural  counties  would  find  it  hard  to  match 
from  all  its  townships  put  together.  Because 
there  is  a  good  deal  of  running  down,  of  degen- 
eration and  waste  of  life,  among  the  richer 
classes,  you  must  not  overlook  the  equally  ob- 
vious fact  I  have  just  spoken  of, — which  in  one 
or  two  generations  more  will  be,  I  think,  much 
more  patent  than  just  now. 

The  weak  point  in  our  chryso-aristocracy  is 
the  same  1  have  alluded  to  in  connection  with 
cheap  dandyism.  Its  thorough  manhood,  its 
high-caste  gallantry,  are  not  so  manifest  as  the 
plate-glass  of  its  windows  and  the  more  or  less 
legitimate  heraldry  of  its  coach-panels.  It  is 
very  curious  to  observe  of  how  small  account 
military  folks  are  held  among  our  Northern 
people.  Our  young  men  must  gild  their  spurs, 
but  they  need  not  win  them.  The  equal  divis- 
ion of  property  keeps  the  younger  sons  of  rich 
people  above  the  necessity  of  military  service. 
Thus  the  army  loses  an  element  of  refinement, 
and  the  moneyed  upper-class  forgets  what  it  is  to 
count  heroism  among  its  virtues.  Still  I  don't 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   28 1 

believe  in  any  aristocracy  without  pluck  as  its 
backbone.  Ours  may  show  it  when  the  time 
comes  if  it  ever  does  come.  These  United 
States  furnish  the  greatest  market  for  intellectual 
green  fruit  of  all  the  places  in  the  world.  I 
think  so,  at  any  rate.  The  demand  for  intel- 
lectual labor  is  so  enormous  and  the  market  so 
far  from  nice,  that  young  talent  is  apt  to  fare 
like  unripe  gooseberries, — get  plucked  to  make 
a  fool  of  Think  of  a  country  which  buys 
eighty  thousand  copies  of  the  "Proverbial  Phil- 
osophy," while  the  author's  admiring  country- 
men have  been  buying  twelve  thousand!  How 
can  one  let  his  fruit  hang  in  the  sun  until  it  gets 
fully  ripe,  while  there  are  eighty  thousand  such 
hungry  mouths  ready  to  swallow  it  and  proclaim 
its  praises?  Consequently  there  never  was  such 
a  collection  of  crude  pippins  and  half-grown 
windfalls  as  our  native  literature  displays  among 
its  fruits.  There  are  literary  green-groceries  at 
every  corner,  which  will  buy  anything,  from  a 
button-pear  to  a  pine-apple.  It  takes  long  ap- 
prenticeship to  train  a  whole  people  to  reading 
and  writing.  The  temptation  of  money  and 
fame  is  too  great  for  young  people.  Do  I  not 
remember  that  glorious  moment  when  the  late 

Mr. ,we  won't  say  who, — editor  of  the , 

we  won't  say  what,  offered  me  the  sum  of  fifty 
cents  j)er  double-columned  quarto  page  for 
shaking  my  young  boughs  over  his  fools  cap 
apron  ?  Was  it  not  an  intoxicating  vision  of 
gold  and  glory?  I  should  doubtless  have  rev- 
eled in  its  wealth  and  splendor,  but  for  learning 
the  fact  that  \hzfifty  cents  was  to  be  considered 


282   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

a  rhetorical  embellishment  and  by  no  means  a 
literal  expression  of  past  fact  or  present  inten- 
tion. 

Beware  of  making  your  moral  staple  consist  of 
the  negative  virtues.  It  is  good  to  abstain,  and 
teach  others  to  abstain,  from  all  that  is  sinful  or 
hurtful.  But  making  a  business  of  it  leads  to 
emaciation  of  character,  unless  one  feed  largely 
also  on  the  more  nutritious  diet  of  active  sym- 
pathetic benevolence. 

I  don't  believe  one  word  of  what  you  are 
saying — spoke  up  the  angular  female  in  black 
bombazine. 

I  am  sorry  you  disbelieve  it,  Madam — I  said, 
and  added  softly  to  my  next  neighbor, — but  you 
prove  it. 

The  young  fellow  sitting  near  me  winked  ; 
and  the  divinity-student  said  in  an  undertone, — 
Op  time  dictum, 

Your  talking  Latin, — said  I, — reminds  me  of 
an  odd  trick  of  one  of  my  old  tutors.  He  read 
so  much  of  that  language,  that  his  English  half 
turned  into  it.  He  got  caught  in  town,  one  hot 
summer,  in  pretty  close  quarters,  and  wrote,  or 
began  to  write,  a  series  of  city  pastorals.  Ec- 
logues he  called  them,  and  meant  to  have  pub- 
lished them  by  subscription.  I  remember  some 
of  his  verses,  if  you  want  to  hear  them. — You, 
Sir  (addressing  myself  to  the  divinity  student), 
and  all  such  as  have  been  through  college,  or, 
what  is  the  same  thing,  received  an  honorary 
degree,  will  understand  them  without  a  diction- 
ary. The  old  man  had  a  great  deal  to  say  about 
"aestivation,"  as  he  called  it,  in  opposition,  as 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   283 

one  might  say,  to  hibernation.  Intramural  aes- 
tivation, or  town-life  in  summer,  he  would  say, 
is  a  peculiar  form  of  suspended  existence,  or 
semi-asphyxia.  One  wakes  up  from  it  about  the 
beginning  of  the  last  week  in  September.  This 
is  what  I  remember  of  his  poem : — 

ESTIVATION, 

An  Unpublished  Poem,  by  my  late  Latin  Tutor. 

In  candent  ire  the  solar  splendor  flames  ; 
The  foles,  languescent,  pend  from  arid  rames; 
His  humid  front  the  cive,  anheling,  wipes, 
And  dreams  of  erring  on  ventiferous  ripes. 

How  dulce  to  vive  occult  to  mortal  eyes, 
Dorm  on  the  herb  with  none  to  supervise, 
Carp  the  suave  berries  from  the  crescent  vine, 
And  bibe  the  flow  from  longicaudate  kine  ! 

To  me,  alas  !  no  verdurous  visions  come, 
Save  yon  exiguous  pool's  conferva-scum, — 
No  concave  vast  repeats  the  tender  hue 
That  laves  my  milk-jug  with  celestial  blue  ! 

Me  wretched  !  Let  me  curr  to  quercine  shades ! 
Effund  your  albid  hausts,  lactiferous  maids ! 
Oh,  might  I  vole  to  some  umbrageous  clump- 
Depart, — be  off, — excede, — evade, — erump ! 

I  have  lived  by  the  sea-shore  and  by  the 
mountains. — No,  lam  not  going  to  say  which  is 
best.  The  one  where  your  place  is  is  the  best 
for  you.  But  this  difference  there  is:  you  can 
domesticate  mountains,  but  the  sea  is  Jera  na- 
jurce.  You  my  have  a  hut,  or  know  the  owner 
of  one,  on  the  mountain-side;  you  see  a  light 


284  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

half-way  up  its  ascent  in  the  evening,  and  you 
know  there  is  a  home,  and  you  might  share  it. 
You  have  noted  certain  trees,  perhaps;  you 
know  the  particular  zone  where  the  hemlocks 
look  so  black  in  October  when  the  maples  and 
beeches  have  faded.  All  the  reliefs  and  intagl- 
ios have  electrotyped  themselves  in  the  medall- 
ions that  hang  round  the  walls  of  your  memory's 
chamber. — The  sea  remembers  nothing.  It  is 
feline.  It  licks  your  feet, — its  huge  flanks  purr 
very  pleasantly  for  you;  but  it  will  crack  your 
bones  and  eat  you,  for  all  that,  and  wipe  the 
crimsoned  foam  from  its  jaws  as  if  nothing  had 
happened.  The  mountains  give  their  lost  chil- 
dren berries  and  water;  the  sea  mocks  their  thirst 
and  lets  them  die.  The  mountains  have  a  grand, 
stupid,  lovable  tranquility ;  the  sea  has  a  fascin- 
ating, treacherous  intelligence.  The  mountains 
lie  about  like  huge  ruminants,  their  broad  backs 
awful  to  look  upon,  but  safe  to  handle.  The  sea 
smooths  its  silver  scales  until  you  cannot  see  their 
joints-4— but  their  shining  is  that  of  a  snake's 
belly,  after  all. — In  deeper  suggestiveness  I  find 
as  great  a  difference.  The  mountains  dwarf 
mankind  and  foreshorten  the  procession  of  its 
long  generations.  The  sea  drowns  out  human- 
ity and  time;  it  has  no  sympathy  with  either; 
for  it  belongs  to  eternity,  and  of  that  it  sings  its 
monotonous  song  forever  and  ever. 

Yet  I  should  love  to  have  a  little  box  by  the 
seashore.  I  should  love  to  gaze  out  on  the  wild 
feline  element  from  a  front  window  of  my  own, 
just  as  I  should  love  to  look  on  a  caged  panther, 
and  see  it  stretch  its  shining  length,  and  then 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  285 

curl  over  and  lap  its  smooth  sides,  and  by  and 
by  begin  to  lash  itself  into  rage  and  show  its 
white  teeth  and  spring  at  its  bars,  and  howl  the 
cry  of  its  mad,  but,  to  me,  harmless  fury. — And 
then, — to  look  at  it  with  that  inward  eye, — who 
does  not  love  to  shuffle  off  time  and  its  concerns, 
at  intervals, — to  forget  who  is  President  and 
who  is  Governor,what  race  he  belongs  to,  what 
language  he  speaks,  which  golden-headed  nail 
of  the  firmament  his  particular  planetary  system 
is  hung  upon,  and  listen  to  the  great  liquid  me- 
tronome as  it  beats  its  solemn  measure,  steadily 
swinging  when  the  solo  or  duet  of  human  life 
began,  and  to  swing  just  as  steadily  after  the 
human  chorus  has  died  out  and  man  is  a  fossil 
on  its  shores? 

What  should  decide  one,  in  choosing  a  sum- 
mer residence? — Constitution,  first  of  all.  How 
much  snow  could  you  melt  in  an  hour,  if  you 
were  planted  in  a  hogshead  of  it?  Comfort  is 
essential  to  enjoyment.  All  sensitive  people 
should  remember  that  persons  in  easy  circum- 
stances suffer  much  more  from  cold  in  summer — 
that  is,  the  warm  half  of  the  year — than  in  win- 
ter, or  the  other  half.  You  must  cut  your  climate 
to  your  constitution, as  much  as  your  clothing  to 
your  shape  After  this,  consult  your  taste  and 
convenience.  But  if  you  would  be  happy  in 
Berkshire,  you  must  carry  mountains  in  your 
brain ;  and  if  you  would  enjoy  Nahant,  you 
must  have  an  ocean  in  your  soul.  Nature  plays 
at  dominos  with  you  ;  you  must  match  her  piece, 
or  she  will  never  give  it  up  to  you. 

The  schoolmistress  said,  in  rather  a  mischiev- 


286  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

cms  way,  that  she  was  afraid  some  minds  or 
souls  would  be  a  little  crowded,  if  they  took  in 
the  Rocky  Mountains  or  the  Atlantic. 

Have  you  ever  read  the  little  book  called 
"The  Stars  and  the  Earth?"— said  I.—  Have  you 
seen  the  Declaration  of  Independence  photo- 
graphed in  a  surface  that  a  fly's  foot  would 
cover?  The  forms  or  conditions  of  Time  and 
Space,  as  Kant  will  tell  you, are  nothing  in  them- 
selves,— only  our  way  of  looking  at  things.  You 
are  right,  I  think,  however,  in  recognizing  the 
idea  of  Space  as  being  quite  as  applicable  to 
minds  as  to  the  outer  world.  Every  man  of  re- 
flection is  vaguely  conscious  of  an  imperfectly 
defined  circle  which  is  drawn  about  his  intel- 
lect. He  has  a  perfectly  clear  sense  that  the 
fragments  of  his  intellectual  circle  include  the 
curves  of  many  other  minds  of  which  he  is  cog- 
nizant. He  often  recognizes  these  as  manifestly 
concentric  with  his  own,  but  of  less  radius.  On 
the  other  hand, when  we  find  a  portion  of  an  arc 
outside  of  our  own,  we  say  it  intersects  ours. but 
are  very  slow  to  confess  or  to  see  that  it  circum- 
scribes it.  Every  now  and  then  a  man's  mind 
is  stretched  by  a  new  idea  or  sensation,  and 
never  shrinks  back  to  its  former  dimensions. 
After  looking  at  the  Alps,  I  felt  that  my  mind 
had  been  stretched  beyond  the  limits  of  its  elas- 
ticity, and  fitted  so  loosel}'  on  my  old  ideas  of 
space  that  I  had  to  spread  these  to  fit  it. 

If  I  thought  I  should  ever  see  the  Alps! — said 
the  schoolmistress. 

Perhaps  you  will, sometime  or  other, — I  said. 

It  is  not  very  likely, — she  answered. — I  have 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   287 

had  one  or  two  opportunities,  but  I  had  rather 
be  anything  than  governess  in  a  rich  family. 

[(Proud,  too,  you  little  soft-voiced  woman ! 
Well,  I  can't  say  I  like  you  any  the  worse  for 
it.  How  long  will  school-keeping  take  to  kill 
you?  Is  it  possible  the  poor  thing  works  with 
her  needle,  too?  I  don't  like  those  marks  on 
the  side  of  her  forefinger. 

Tableau.  Chamouni.  Mont  Blanc  in  full  view. 
Figures  in  the  foreground  ;  two  of  them  standing 
apart;  one  of  them  a  gentleman  of — oh, — ah, — 
yes!  the  other  a  lady  in  a  white  cashmere, lean- 
ing on  his  shoulder. — The  ingenuous  reader 
will  understand  that  this  was  an  internal, private, 
personal,  subjective  diorama,  seen  for  one  in- 
stant on  the  background  of  my  own  conscious- 
ness and  abolished  into  black  nonentity  by  the 
first  question  which  recalled  me  to  actual  life, as 
suddenly  as  if  one  of  those  iron  shop-blinds 
(which  I  always  pass  at  dusk  with  a  shiver,  ex- 
pecting to  stumble  over  some  poor  but  honest 
shop-boy's  head,  just  taken  off  by  its  sudden 
and  unexpected  descent,  and  left  outside  upon 
the  sidewalk)  had  come  down  in  front  of  it  "by 
the  run."] 

Should  you  like  to  hear  what  moderate  wishes 
life  brings  one  to  at  last?  I  used  to  be  very  am- 
bitious, wasteful,  extravagant,  and  luxurious  in 
all  my  fancies.  Read  too  much  in  the  "Ara- 
bian Nights."  Must  have  the  lamp, — couldn't 
do  without  the  ring.  Exercise  every  morning 
on  the  brazen  horse.  Plump  down  into  castles 
as  full  of  little  milk-white  princesses  as  a  nest  is 
of  young  sparrows.  All  love  me  dearly  at  once. 


288  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Charming  idea  of  life,  but  too  high-colored  for 
the  reality.  I  have  outgrown  all  this;  my  tastes 
have  become  exeedingly  primitive, — almost, 
perhaps,  ascetic.  We  carry  happiness  into  our 
condition,  but  must  not  hope  to  find  it  there;  I 
think  you  will  be  willing  to  hear  some  lines 
which  embody  the  subdued  and  limited  desires 
of  my  maturity. 

CONTENTMENT. 
"Man  wants  but  little  here  below." 
Little  I  ask;  my  wants  are  few; 

I  only  wish  a  hut  of  stone, 
(A  very  plain  brown  stone  will  do) 
That  I  may  call  my  own; — 
And  close  at  hand  is  such  a  one, 
In  yonder  street  that  fronts  the  sun. 

Plain  food  is  quite  enough  for  me; 

Three  courses  are  as  good  as  ten; — 
If  Nature  can  subsist  on  three, 

Thank  Heaven  for  three.     AmenI 
I  always  thought  cold  victuals  nice, — 
My  choice  would  be  vanilla-ice. 

I  care  not  much  for  gold  or  land; — 

Give  me  a  mortgage  here  and  there,^- 

Some  good  bank-stock, — some  note  of  hand, 
Or  trifling  railroad  share; — 

I  only  ask  that  Fortune  send 

A  little  more  than  I  shall  spend. 

Honors  are  silly  toys,  I  know, 

And  titles  are  but  empty  names; — 

I  would,  perhaps,  be  Plenipo, 

But  only  near  St.  James; — 

I'm  very  sure  I  should  not  care 

To  fill  our  Gubernators  chair. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  289 

Jewels  are  baubles;  'tis  a  sin 

To  care  for  such  unfruitful  things; — 

One  good-sized  diamond  in  a  pin, — 
Some,  not  so  large,  in  rings, — 

A  ruby,  and  a  pearl,  or  so, 

Will  do  for  me, — I  laugh  at  show. 

My  dame  should  dress  in  cheap  attire; 

(Good,  heavy  silks  are  never  dear) — 
I  own  perhaps  I  might  desire 

Some  shawls  of.  true  cashmere, — 
Some  marrowy  crapes  of  China  silk, 
Like  wrinkled  skins  on  scalded  milk. 

I  would  not  have  the  horse  I  drive 

So  fast  that  folks  must  stop  and  stare; 

An  easy  gait, — two-forty-five — 
Suits  me,  I  do  not  care; — 

Perhaps,  for  just  a  single  spurt 

Some  seconds  less  would  do  no  hurt. 

Of  pictures,  I  should  like  to  own 

Titians  and  Raphaels  three  or  four, — 

I  love  so  much  their  style  and  tone, — 
One  Turner,  and  no  more, — 

(A  landscape,  foreground  golden  dirt; — 

The  sunshine  painted  with  a  squirt.) — 

Of  books  but  few,  some  fifty  score 

For  daily  use,  and  bound  for  wear; 

The  rest  upon  an  upper  floor; — 
Some  little  luxury  there 

Of  red  morocco's  gilded  gleam, 

And  vellum  rich  as  country  cream. 

Busts,  cameos,  gems, — such  things  as  these, 
Which  others  often  show  for  pride, 

I  value  for  their  power  to  please, 
And  selfish  churls  deride; 


2pO  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

One  Stradivarius,  I  confess, 

Two  Meerschaums,  I  would  fain  possess. 

Wealth's  wasteful  tricks  I  will  not  learn, 
Nor  ape  the  glittering  upstart  fool; 

Shall  not  carved  tables  serve  my  turn? 
But  all  must  be  of  buhl. 

Give  grasping  pomp  its  double  share, — 

I  ask  but  one  recumbent  chair. 

Thus  humble  let  me  live  and  die, 

Nor  long  for  Midas'  golden  touch; 

If  Heaven  more  generous  gifts  deny, 
I  shall  not  miss  them  much, 

Too  grateful  for  the  blessing  lent 

Of  simple  tastes  and  mind  content. 

MY  LAST  WALK  WITH  THE  SCHOOL-MISTRESS. 

(A  Parenthesis.} 

I  can't  say  just  how  many  walks  she  and  I 
had  taken  together  before  this  one.  I  found  the 
effect  of  going  out  every  morning  was  decidedly 
favorable  on  her  health.  Two  pleasing  dimples, 
the  places  for  which  were  just  marked  when  she 
came,  played,  shadowy, in  her  freshening  cheeks 
when  she  smiled  and  nodded  good-morning  to 
me  from  the  schoolhouse  steps. 

I  am  afraid  I  did  the  greater  part  of  the  talk- 
ing. At  any  rate,  if  I  should  try  to  report  all 
that  I  said  during  the  first  half-dozen  walks  we 
took  together,  I  fear  that  I  might  receive  a  gentle 
hint  from  my  friends  the  publishers,  that  a  separ- 
ate volume,  at  my  own  risk  and  expense,  would 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  29! 

be  the  proper  method  of  bringing  them  before 
the  public. 

I  would  have  a  woman  as  true  as  Death.  At 
the  tirst  real  lie  which  works  from  the  heart  out- 
ward, she  should  be  tenderly  chloroformed  into 
a  better  world,  where  she  can  have  an  angel  for 
a  governess,  and  feed  on  strange  fruits  which 
will  make  her  all  over  again,  even  to  her  bones 
and  marrow. — Whether  gifted  with  the  acci- 
dent of  beauty  or  not,  she  should  have  been 
molded  in  the  rose-red  clay  of  Love,  before  the 
breath  of  life  made  a  moving  mortal  of  her. 
Love-capacity  is  a  congenital  endowment;  and 
I  think,  after  a  while,  one  gets  to  know  the 
warm-hued  natures  it  belongs  to  from  the  pretty 
pipe-clay  counterfeits  of  it. — Proud  she  may  be, 
in  the  sense  of  lespecting  herself;  but  pride,  in 
the  sense  of  contemning  others  less  gifted  than 
herself,  deserves  the  two  lowest  circles  of  a 
vulgar  woman's  Inferno, where  the  punishments 
are  Smallpox  and  Bankruptcy. — She  who  nips 
off  the  end  of  a  brittle  courtesy,  as  one  breaks 
the  tip  of  an  icicle,  to  bestow  upon  those 
whom  she  ought  cordially  and  kindly  to  recog- 
nize, proclaims  the  fact  that  she  comes  not 
merely  of  low  blood,  but  of  bad  blood.  Con- 
sciousness of  unquestioned  position  makes  people 
gracious  in  proper  measure  to  all ;  but  if  a 
woman  puts  on  airs  with  her  real  equals,  she 
has  something  about  herself  or  her  family  she  is 
ashamed  of,  or  ought  to  be.  Middle,  and  more 
than  middle-aged  people,  who  know  family  his- 
tories, generally  see  through  it.  An  official  of 
standing  was  rude  to  me  once.  Oh,  that  is  the 


292  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

maternal  grandfather, — said  a  wise  old  friend  to 
me, — he  was  a  boor. — Better  too  few  words, 
from  the  woman  we  love,  than  too  many:  while 
she  is  silent,  Nature  is  working  for  her;  while 
she  talks,  she  is  working  for  herself. — Love  is 
sparingly  soluble  in  the  words  of  men  ;  therefore 
they  speak  much  of  it;  but  one  syllable  of 
woman's  speech  can  dissolve  more  of  it  than  a 
man's  heart  can  hold. 

Whether  I  said  any  or  all  of  these  things  to  the 
schoolmistress  or  not, — whether  I  stole  them  out 
of  Lord  Bacon, — whether  I  cribbed  them  from 
Balzac, — whether  I  dipped  them  from  the  ocean 
of  Tupperian  wisdom, — or  whether  I  have  just 
foun.d  them  in  my  head,  laid  there  by  that 
solemn  fowl,  Experience  (who, according  to  my 
observation,  cackles  oftener  than  she  drops  real 
live  eggs), — I  cannot  say.  Wise  men  have  said 
more  foolish  things, — and  foolish  men,  I  don't 
doubt,  have  said  as  wise  things.  Anyhow,  the 
schoolmistress  and  I  had  pleasant  walks  and 
long  talks,  all  of  which  I  do  not  feel  bound  to 
report. 

You  are  a  stranger  to  me,  Ma'am. — I  don't 
doubt  you  would  like  to  know  all  I  said  to  the 
schoolmistress. — I  shan't  do  it; — I  had  rather 
get  the  publishers  to  return  the  money  you  have 
invested  in  this.  Besides,  I  have  forgotten  a 
good  deal  of  it.  I  shall  tell  only  what  I  like  of 
what  I  remember. 

My  idea  was,  in  the  first  place,  to  search  out 
the  picturesque  spots  which  the  city  affords  a 
sight  of,  to  those  who  have  eyes.  I  know  a  good 
many,  and  it  was  a  pleasure  to  look  at  them  in 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  293 

company  with  my  young  friend.  There  were 
the  shrubs  and  flowers  in  the  Franklin  Place 
front-yards  or  borders;  commerce  is  just  putting 
his  granite  foot  upon  them.  Then  there  are 
certain  small  seraglio  gardens, into  which  one  can 
get  a  peep  through  the  crevices  of  high  fences, — 
one  in  Myrtle  Street,  or  backing  on  it, — here 
and  there  one  at  the  North  and  South  Ends. 
Then  the  great  elms  in  Essex  Street.  Then  the 
stately  horse-chestnuts  in  that  vacant  lot  in 
Chambers  Street,  which  hold  their  outspread 
hands  over  your  head  (as  I  said  in  my  poem  the 
other  day), and  look  as  if  they  were  whispering, 
"May  grace, mercy, and  peace  be  with  you!"and 
the  rest  of  that  benediction.  Nay,  there  are 
certain  patches  of  ground,  which,  having  Jain 
neglected  for  a  time,  Nature,  who  always  has 
her  pockets  full  of  seeds,  and  holes  in  all  her 
pockets,  has  covered  with  hungry  plebeian 
growths,  which  fight  for  life  with  each  other, 
until  some  of  them  get  broad-leaved  and  succu- 
lent, and  you  have  a  coarse  vegetable  tapestry 
which  Raphael  would  not  have  disdained  to 
spread  over  the  foreground  of  his  masterpiece. 
The  Professor  pretends  that  he  found  such  a  one 
in  Charles  Street, which,  in  its  dare-devil  impu- 
dence of  rough-and-tumble  vegetation,  beat  the 
pretty-behaved  flower-beds  of  Public  Garden  as 
ignominiously  as  a  group  of  young  tatterdema- 
lions playing  pitch-and-toss  beats  a  row  of  Sun- 
day-school boys  with  their  teacher  at  their 
head. 

But  then  the  Professor  has  one  of  his  burrows 
in    that    region,  and    puts    everything  in  high 


2p4  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

colors  relating  to  it.  That  is  his  way  about  every- 
thing.— I  hold  any  man  cheap, — he  said, — of 
whom  nothing  stronger  can  be  uttered  than  that 
all  his  geese  are  swans. — How  is  that, Professor? 
said  I ; — I  should  have  set  you  down  for  one  of 
that  sort. — Sir,  said  he,  I  am  proud  to  say  that 
Nature  has  so  far  enriched  me,  that  I  cannot 
own  so  much  as  a  duck  without  seeing  in  it  as 
pretty  a  swan  as  ever  swam  the  basin  in  the 
garden  of  Luxembourg.  And  the  Professor 
showed  the  whites  of  his  eyes  devoutly, like  one 
returning  thanks  after  a  dinner  of  many  courses. 
I  don't  know  anything  sweeter  than  this  leak- 
ing in  of  Nature  through  all  the  cracks  in  the 
walls  and  floors  of  cities.  You  heap  up  a  mil- 
lion tons  of  hewn  rocks  on  a  square  mile  or  two 
of  earth  which  was  green  once.  The  trees  look 
down  from  the  hill-sides  and  ask  each  other,  as 
they  stand  on  tiptoe,  "What  are  these  people 
about?"  And  the  small  herbs  at  their  feet  look 
up  and  whisper  back, — "We  will  go  and  see." 
So  the  small  herbs  pack  themselves  up  in  the  least 
possible  bundles,  and  wait  until  the  wind  steals 
to  them  at  night  and  whispers, — "Come  with 
me."  Then  they  go  softly  with  it  into  the  great 
city, — one  to  a  cleft  in  the  pavement,  one  to  a 
spout  on  the  roof,  one  to  a  seam  in  the  marbles 
over  a  rich  gentleman's  bones,  and  one  to  the 
grave  without  a  stone  where  nothing  but  a  man 
is  buiied, — and  there  they  grow,  looking  down 
on  the  generations  of  men  from  moldy  roofs, 
looking  up  from  between  the  less-trodden  pave- 
ments, looking  out  through  iron  cemetery-rail- 
ings. Listen  to  them,  when  there  is  only  a 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  295 

light  breath  stirring,  and  you  will  hear  them 
saying  to  each  other, — "Wait  awhile!"  The 
words  run  along  the  telegraph  of  the  narrow 
green  lines  that  border  the  roads  leading  from 
the  city,  until  they  reach  the  slope  of  the  hills, 
and  the  trees  repeat  in  low  murmurs  to  each 
other,  "Wait  awhile!"  By  and  by  the  flow  of 
life  in  the  streets  ebbs, and  the  old  leafy  inhabit- 
ants— the  smaller  tribes  always  in  front — saunter 
in,  one  by, one,  very  careless  seemingty,  but 
very  tenacious,  until  they  swarm  so  that  the 
great  stones  gape  from  each  other  with  the 
crowding  of  their  roots,  and  the  feldspar  begins 
to  be  picked  out  of  the  granite  to  find  them  food. 
At  last  the  trees  take  up  their  solemn  line  of 
march, and  never  rest  until  they  have  encamped 
in  the  market-place.  Wait  long  enough  and 
you  will  find  an  old  doting  oak  hugging  a  huge 
worn  block  in  its  yellow  underground  arms; 
that  was  the  corner-stone  of  the  State  House. 
Oh,  so  patient  she  is,  this  imperturbable  Nature! 

— Let  us  cry ! — 

But  all  this  has  nothing  to  do  with  my  walks 
and  talks  with  the  schoolmistress.  I  did  not 
say  that  I  would  not  tell  you  something  about 
them.  Let  me  alone,  and  I  shall  talk  to  you 
more  than  I  ought  to,  probably.  We  never  tell 
our  secrets  to  people  that  pump  for  them. 

Books  we  talked  about,  and  education.  It 
was  her  duty  to  know  something  of  these,  and 
of  course  she  did.  Perhaps  I  was  somewhat 
more  learned  than  she,  but  I  found  that  the 
difference  between  her  reading  and  mine  was 
like  that  of  a  man's  and  a  woman's  dusting  a 


296  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

library.  The  man  flaps  about  with  a  bunch  of 
feathers;  the  woman  goes  to  work  softly, with  a 
cloth.  She  does  not  raise  half  the  dust,  nor  fill 
her  own  eyes  and  mouth  with  it,  but  she  goes 
into  all  the  corners  and  attends  to  the  leaves  as 
much  as  the  covers.  Books  are  the  negative 
pictures  of  thought,  and  the  more  sensitive  the 
mind  that  receives  their  images, the  more  nicely 
the  finest  lines  are  reproduced.  A  woman  (of 
the  right  kind), reading  after  a  man, follows  him 
as  Ruth  followed  the  reapers  of  Boaz,  and  her 
gleanings  are  often  the  finest  of  the  wheat. 

But  it  was  in  talking  of  life  that  we  came  most 
nearly  together.  I  thought  I  knew  something 
about  that, — that  I  could  speak  or  write  about  it 
somewhat  to  the  purpose. 

To  take  up  this  fluid  earthly  being  of  ours  as 
a  sponge  sucks  up  water, — to  be  steeped  and 
soaked  in  its  realities  as  a  hide  fills  its  pores 
lying  seven  years  in  a  tan-pit, — to  have  win- 
nowed every  wave  of  it  as  a  mill-wheel  works 
up  the  stream  that  runs  through  the  flume  upon 
its  float-boards, — to  have  curled  up  in  the  keenest 
spasms  and  flattened  out  in  the  laxest  languors  of 
this  breathing-sickness  which  keeps  certain  par- 
cels of  matter  uneasy  for  three  or  four-score 
years, — to  have  fought  all  the  devils  and  clasped 
all  the  angels  of  its  delirium,  and  then,  just  at 
the  point  when  the  white-hot  passions  have 
cooled  down  to  cherry-red,  plunge  our  experi- 
ence into  the  ice-cold  stream  of  some  human 
language  or  other,  one  might  think  would  end 
in  a  rhapsody  with  something  of  spring  and 
temper  in  it.  All  this  I  thought  my  power  and 
province. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   297 

The  schoolmistress  had  tried  life,  too.  Once 
in  a  while  one  meets  with  a  single  soul  greater 
than  all  the  living  pageant  that  passes  before  it. 
As  the  pale  astronomer  sits  in  his  study,  with 
sunken  eyes  and  thin  fingers,  and  weighs 
Uranus  or  Neptune  as  in  a  balance,  so  there  are 
meek,  slight  women  who  have  weighed  all  this 
planetary  life  can  offer, and  hold  it  like  a  bauble 
in  the  palm  of  their  slender  hands.  This  was 
one  of  them.  Fortune  had  left  her,  sorrow  had 
baptized  her;  the  routine  of  labor  and  the  lone- 
liness of  almost  friendless  city-life  were  before 
her.  Yet,  as  I  looked  upon  her  tranquil  face, 
gradually  regaining  a  cheerfulness  that  was  often 
sprightly, as  she  became  interested  in  the  various 
matters  we  talked  about  and  places  we  visited, 
I  saw  that  eye  and  lip  and  every  shifting  linea- 
ment were  made  for  love, — unconscious  of  their 
sweet  office  as  yet,  and  meeting  the  cold  aspect 
of  Duty  with  the  natural  graces  which  were 
meant  for  the  reward  of  nothing  less  than  the 
Great  Passion. 

I  never  spoke  one  word  of  love  to  the  school- 
mistress in  the  course  of  these  pleasant  walks. 
It  seemed  to  me  that  we  talked  of  everything 
but  love  on  that  particular  morning.  There 
was,  perhaps,  a  little  more  timidity  and  hesi- 
tancy on  my  part  than  I  have  commonly  shown 
among  our  people  at  the  boarding-house.  In 
fact,  I  considered  myself  the  master  at  the  break- 
fast-table; but,  somehow,  I  could  not  command 
myself  just  then  so  well  as  usual.  The  truth  is, 
I  had  secured  a  passage  to  Liverpool  in  the 
steamer  which  was  to  leave  at  noon,  with  the 


2p8   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

condition, however,of  being  released  in  case  cir- 
cumstances occurred  to  detain  me.  The  school- 
mistress knew  nothing  about  all  this,  of  course, 
as  yet. 

It  was  on  the  Common  that  we  were  walking. 
The  mall,  or  boulevard  of  our  common,  you 
know,  has  various  branches  leading  from  it  in 
different  directions.  One  of  these  runs  down- 
ward from  opposite  Joy  Street  southward  across 
the  whole  length  of  the  Common  to  Boylston 
Street.  We  called  it  the  long  path,  and  were 
fond  of  it. 

I  felt  very  weak  indeed  (though  of  a  tolerably 
robust  habit)  as  we  came  opposite  the  head  of 
this  path  on  that  morning.  I  think  I  tried  to 
speak  twice  without  making  myself  distinctly 
audible.  At  last  I  got  out  the  question, — Will 
you  take  the  long  path  with  me? — Certainly, — 
said  the  schoolmistress, — with  much  pleasure. — 
Think, — I  said, — before  you  answer ;  if  you  take 
the  long  path  with  me  now,  I  shall  interpret  it 
that  we  are  to  part  no  more! — The  schoolmis- 
tress stepped  back  with  a  sudden  movement,  as 
if  an  arrow  had  struck  her. 

One  of  the  long  granite  blocks  used  as  seats 
was  hard  by, — the  one  you  may  still  see  close 
by  the  Gingko-tree. — Pray, sit  down, — I  said. — 
No,  no, — she  answered,  softly,  I  will  walk  the 
long  path  with  you. 

The  old  gentleman  who  sits  opposite  met  us 
walking,  arm  in  arm,  about  the  middle  of  the 
long  path,  and  said  very  charmingly:  "Good- 
morning,  my  dears!" 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   299 
XII. 

[I  did  not  think  it  probable  that  I  should  have 
a  great  many  more  talks  with  our  company, and 
therefore  I  was  anxious  to  get  as  much  as  I 
could  into  every  conversation.  That  is  the  rea- 
son why  you  will  find  some  odd,  miscellaneous 
facts  here,  which  I  wished  to  tell  at  least  once, 
as  I  should  not  have  a  chance  to  tell  them  habit- 
ually, at  our  breakfast-table. — We're  very  free 
and  easy,  you  know;  we  don't  read  what  we 
don't  like.  Our  parish  is  so  large,  one  can't 
pretend  to  preach  to  all  the  pews  at  once. 
Besides,  one  can't  be  all  the  time  trying  to  do 
the  best  of  one's  best;  if  a  company  works  a 
steam  fire-engine,  the  firemen  needn't  try  by 
straining  themselves  all  day  to  squirt  over  the 
flagstaff.  Let  them  wash  some  of  those  lower- 
story  windows  a  little.  Besides,  there  is  no  use 
in  our  quarreling  now, as  you  will  find  out  when 
you  get  through  this  paper.] 

Travel,  according  to  my  experience,  does  not 
exactly  correspond  to  the  idea  one  gets  of  it  out 
of  most  books  of  travels.  I  am  thinking  of 
travel  as  it  was  when  I  made  the  Grand  Tour, 
especially  in  Italy.  Memory  is  a  net;  one  finds 
it  full  of  fish  when  he  takes  it  from  the  brook ; 
but  a  dozen  miles  of  water  have  run  through  it 
without  sticking.  I  can  prove  some  facts  about 
traveling  by  a  story  or  two.  There  are  certain 
principles  to  be  assumed, — such  as  these: — He 
who  is  carried  by  horses  must  deal  with  rogues. 
— To-day's  dinner  subtends  a  larger  visual  angle 
than  yesterday's  revolution.  A  mote  in  my  eye 


3OO  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABI.E 

is  bigger  to  me  than  the  biggest  of  Dr.  Gould's 
private  planets.      Every  traveler  is  a  self-taught 
entomologist.      Old  jokes  are    dynamometers  of 
mental    tension;   an  old  joke  tells  better  among 
friends   traveling    than    at    home,  which  shows 
that  their  minds  are   in   a     state    of  diminished, 
rather  than  increased  vitality.     There  was  a  story 
about  "strahps  to  your  pahnts,"  which  was  vastly 
funny  to  us  fellows — on  the  road  from  Milan  to 
Venice.    Cvelum,  non  animuni, — travelers  change 
their  guineas  but  not  their  characters.  The  bore  is 
the  same  eating  dates  under  the  cedars  of   Leb- 
anon, as  over  a  plate  of  baked  beans  in  Beacon 
Street.      Parties    of    travelers  have     a    morbid 
instinct    for    u establishing     raws''    upon     each 
other.      A  man  shall  sit  down  with  his  friend  at 
the  foot  of  the  Great  Pyramid  and  they  will  take 
up    the    question    they  had  been  talking  about 
under  the ''great    elms,"  and    forget    all    about 
Egypt.      When  I  was  crossing  the  Po,  we  were 
all  fighting  about  the  propriety  of  one    fellow's 
telling    another   that   his  argument  was  absurd; 
one    maintaining  it  to  be  a  perfectly  admissible 
logical    term,  as  proved  by  the  phrase,  "reduc- 
tio   ad   absurdum;"  the  rest  badgering    him    as 
a  conversational  bully.   Mighty  little  we  troubled 
ourselves  for  Padits,  the  Po,  "a  river    broader 
and  more  rapid  than  the  Rhone,"  and  the  times 
when  Hannibal  led    his    grim    Africans    to    its 
banks,  and  his  elephants  thrust  their  trunks  into 
the  yellow  waters    over   which   that    pendulum 
ferry  boat  was  swinging  back  and  forward  every 
ten  minutes! 

Here  are  some  of    those   reminiscences,  with 
morals  prefixed,  or  annexed,  or  implied. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST  TABLE   30! 

Lively  emotions  very  commonly  do  not  strike 
us' full  in  front,  but  obliquely  from  the  side;  a 
scene  or  incident  in  undress  often  affects  more 
than  one  in  full  costume. 

"Is  this  the  mighty  ocean? — Is  this  all?" 

sa}'S  the  Princess  in  Gebir.  The  rush  that 
should  have  flooded  my  soul  in  the  Coliseum 
did  not  come.  But  walking  one  day  in  the  fields 
about  the  city  I  stumbled  over  a  fragment  of 
broken  masonry,  and  lo!  the  World's  Mistress 
in  her  stone  girdle — alta  mania  Ramce — rose 
before  me  and  whitened  my  cheek  with  her  pale 
shadow  as  never  before  or  since. 

I  used  very  often,  when  coming  home  from 
my  morning's  work  at  one  of  the  public  institu- 
tions of  Paris,  to  stop  at  the  dear  old  church  of 
St.  Etienne  du  Mont.  The  tomb  of  St.  Gene- 
vieve, surrounded  by  burning  candles  and  votive 
tablets,  was  there;  the  mural  tablet  of  Jacobus 
Benignus  Winslow  was  there;  there  was  a  noble 
organ  with  carved  figures;  the  pulpit  was  borne 
on  the  oaken  shoulders  of  a  stooping  Samson ; 
and  there  was  a  marvelous  staircase  like  a  coil 
of  lace.  These  things  I  mention  from  memory, 
but  not  all  of  them  together  impressed  me  so 
much  as  an  inscription  on  a  small  slab  of  marble 
fixed  in  one  of  the  walls.  It  told  how  this 
church  of  St.  Stephen  was  repaired  and  beautified 
in  the  year  16**,  and  how,  during  the  cele- 
bration of  its  reopening,  two  girls  of  the  parish 
(-filles  de  la  -paroisse)  fell  from  the  gallery, 
carrying  a  part  of  the  balustrade  with  them,  to 
the  pavement,  but  by  a  miracle  escaped  unin- 
jured. Two  young  girls,  nameless,  but  real 


3O2  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

presences  to  my  imagination,  as  much  as  when 
they  came  fluttering  down  on  the  tiles  with  a 
cry  that  outscreamed  the  sharpest  treble  in  the 
Te  Deum!  (Look  at  Carlyle's  article  on  Bos- 
well,  and  see  how  he  speaks  of  the  poor  young 
woman  Johnson  talked  with  in  the  streets  one 
evening.)  All  the  crowd  gone  but  these  two 
"filles  de  la  paroisse," — gone  as  utterly  as 
the  dresses  they  wore,  as  the  shoes  that  were  on 
their  feet,as  the  bread  and  meat  that  were  in  the 
market  on  that  day. 

Not  great  historical  events,  but  the  personal 
incidents  that  call  up  single  sharp  pictures  of 
some  human  being  in  its  pang  or  struggle, reach 
us  most  nearly.  I  remember  the  platform  at 
Berne,  over  the  parapet  of  which  Theobald 
Weinzapfli's  restive  horse  sprung  with  him  and 
landed  him  more  than  a  hundred  feet  beneath  in 
the  lower  town,  not  dead,  but  sorely  broken, and 
no  longer  a  wild  youth,  but  God's  servant  from 
that  day  forward.  I  have  forgotten  the  famous 
bears,  and  all  else.  I  remember  the  Percy  lion 
on  the  bridge  over  the  little  river  at  Alnwick, — 
the  leaden  lion  with  his  tail  stretched  out  straight 
like  a  pump-handle, — and  why?  Because  of  the 
story  of  the  village  boy  who  must  fain  bestride 
the  leaden  tail,  standing  out  over  the  water, — 
which  breaking,  he  dropped  into  the  stream  far 
below,  and  was  taken  oat  an  idiot  for  the  rest  of 
his  life. 

Arrow-heads  must  be  brought  to  a  sharp  point, 
and  the  guillotine-axe  must  have  a  slanting  edge. 
Something  intensely  human,  narrow,  and  defin- 
ite pierces  to  the  seat  of  our  sensibilities  more 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   303 

readily  than  huge  occurrences  and  catastrophes. 
A  nail  will  pick  a  lock  that  defies  hatchet  and 
hammer.  "The  Royal  George"  went  down 
with  all  her  crew  and  Cowper  wrote  an  exquis- 
itely simple  poem  about  it;  but  the  leaf  that  holds 
it  is  smooth,  while  that  which  bears  the  lines  on 
his  mother's  portrait  is  blistered  with  tears. 

My  telling  these  recollections  sets  me  thinking 
of  others  of  the  same  kind  that  strike  the  im- 
agination, especially  when  one  is  still  young. 
You  remember  the  monument  in  Devizes  market 
to  the  woman  struck  dead  with  a  lie  in  her 
mouth.  I  never  saw  that,  but  it  is  in  the  books. 
Here  is  one  I  never  heard  mentioned; — if  any 
of  the  "Note  and  Query"tribe  can  tell  the  story, 
. I  hope  they  will.  Where  is  this  monument?  I 
was  riding  on  an  English  stage-coach  when  we 
passed  a  handsome  marble  column  (as  I  remem- 
ber it)  of  considerable  size  and  pretensions. 
What  is  that? — I  said.  That, — answered  the 
coachman, — is  the  hangman's  pillar.  Then  he 
told  me  how  a  man  went  out  one  night,  many 
years  ago,  to  steal  sheep.  He  caught  one,  tied 
its  legs  together,  passed  the  rope  over  his  head, 
and  started  for  home.  In  climbing  a  fence,  the 
rope  slipped,  caught  him  by  the  neck,  and 
strangled  him.  Next  morning  he  was  found  dead 
on  the  one  side  of  the  fence  and  the  sheep  on 
the  other;  in  memory  whereof  the  lord  of  the 
manor  caused  this  monument  to  be  erected  as  a 
warning  to  all  who  love  mutton  better  than  vir- 
tue. I  will  send  a  copy  of  this  record  to  him 
or  her  who  shall  first  set  me  right  about  this 
column  and  its  locality. 


304  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

And  telling  over  these  old  stories  reminds  me 
that  I  have  something  that  may  interest  archi- 
tects and  perhaps  some  other  persons.  I  once 
ascended  the  spire  of  Strasburg  Cathedral, 
which  is  the  highest,  I  think,  in  Europe.  It  is 
a  shaft  of  stone  filigree-work,  frightfully  open, 
so  that  the  guide  puts  his  arms  behind  you  to 
keep  you  from  falling.  To  climb  it  is  a  noonday 
nightmare,  and  to  think  of  having  climbed  it 
crisps  all  the  fifty-six  joints  of  one's  twenty 
digits.  While  I  was  on  it,  "pinnacled  dim  in 
the  intense  inane,"  a  strong  wind  was  blowing, 
and  I  felt  sure  that  the  spire  was  rocking.  It 
swayed  back  and  forward  like  a  stalk  of  rye  or 
a  cat-o'-nine-tails(bulrush)with  a  bobolink  on  it. 
I  mentioned  it  to  the  guide  and  he  said  that  the 
spire  did  really  swing  back  and  forward, — I 
think  he  said  some  feet. 

Keep  any  line  of  knowledge  ten  years  and 
some  other  line  will  intersect  it.  Long  after- 
wards, I  was  hunting  out  a  paper  of  Dumeril's 
in  an  old  journal, — the  "  Magazin  Encyclope- 
dique1"1  for  Van  troisieme  (1795),  when  I 
stumbled  upon  a  brief  article  on  the  vibrations 
of  the  spire  of  Strasburg  Cathedral.  A  man  can 
shake  it  so  that  the  movement  shall  be  shown  in 
a  vessel  of  water  nearly  seventy  feet  below  the 
summit,  and  higher  up  the  vibration  is  like  that 
of  an  earthquake.  I  have  seen  one  of  those 
wretched  wooden  spires  with  which  we  very 
shabbily  finish  some  of  our  stone  churches  (think- 
ing that  the  lidless  blue  eye  of  heaven  cannot  tell 
the  counterfeit  we  try  to  pass  on  it)  swinging 
like  a  reed  in  a  wind,  but  one  would  hardly 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   305 

think  of  such  a  thing's  happening  in  a  stone 
spire.  Does  the  Bunker  Hill  Monument  bend 
in  the  blast  like  a  blade  of  grass?  I  suppose  so. 

You  see,  of  course,  that  I  am  talking  in  a 
cheap  way; — perhaps  we  will  have  some  phil- 
osophy by  and  by; — let  me  work  out  this  thin 
mechanical  vein. — I  have  somewhat  more  to 
say  about  trees.  I  have  brought  down  this  slice 
of  hemlock  to  show  you.  Tree  blew  down  in 
my  woods  (that  were)  in  1852.  Twelve  feet  and 
a  half  round,  fair  girth; — nine  feet,  where  I  got- 
my  section,  higher  up.  This  is  a  wedge,  going 
to  the  center,  of  the  general  shape  of  a  slice  of 
apple-pie  in  a  large  and  not  opulent  family. 
Length,  about  eighteen  inches.  I  have  studied 
the  growth  of  this  tree  by  its  rings,  and  it  is 
curious.  Three  hundred  and  forty-two  rings. 
Started,  therefore,  about  1510.  The  thickness 
of  the  rings  tells  the  rate  at  which  it  grew.  For 
five  or  six  years  the  rate  was  slow, — then  rapid 
for  twenty  years.  A  little  before  the  yeai  1550 
it  began  to  grow  very  slowly,  and  so  continued 
for  about  seventy  years.  In  1620  it  took  a  new 
start  and  grew  fast  until  1714;  then  for  the  most 
part  slowly  until  1786,  when  it  started  again  and 
grew  pretty  well  and  uniformly  until  within  the 
last  dozen  years,  when  it  seems  to  have  got  on 
sluggishly. 

Look  here.  Here  are  some  human  lives  laid 
down  against  the  periods  of  its  growth, to  which 
they  corresponded.  This  is  Shakespeare's.  The 
tree  was  seven  inches  in  diameter  when  he  was 
born ;  ten  inches  when  he  died.  A  little  less 
than  ten  inches  when  Milton  was  born;  seven- 


306  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

teen  when  he  died.  Then  comes  a  long  inter- 
val, and  this  thread  marks  out  Johnson's  life, 
during  which  the  tree  increased  from  twenty- 
two  to  twenty-nine  inches  in  diameter.  Here 
is  the  span  of  Napoleon's  career; — the  tree 
doesn't  seem  to  have  minded  it. 

I  never  saw  the  man  yet  who  was  not  startled 
at  looking  on  this  section.  I  have  seen  many 
wooden  preachers, — never  one  like  this.  How 
much  more  striking  would  be  the  calendar 
counted  on  the  rings  of  one  of  those  awful  trees 
which  were  standing  when  Christ  was  on  earth, 
and  where  that  brief  mortal  life  is  chronicled 
with  the  stolid  apathy  of  vegetable  being, which 
remembers  all  human  history  as  a  thing  of  yester- 
day in  its  own  dateless  existence! 

I  have  something  more  to  say  about  elms.  A 
relative  tells  me  there  is  one  of  great  glory  in 
Andover,  near  Bradford.  I  have  some  recol- 
lections of  the  former  place,  pleasant  and  other- 
wise. [I  wonder  if  the  old  Seminary  clock 
strikes  as  slowly  as  it  used  to.  My  room-mate 
thought,  when  he  first  came,  it  was  the  bell 
tolling  deaths,  and  people's  ages,  as  they  do  in 
the  country.  He  swore — (ministers'  sons  get  so 
familiar  with  good  words  that  they  are  apt  to 
handle  them  carelessly) — that  the  children  were 
dying  by  the  dozen,  of  all  ages,  from  one  to 
twelve,  and  ran  off  next  day  in  recess,  when  it 
began  to  strike  eleven,  but  was  caught  before  it 
got  through  striking.]  At  the  foot  of  "the  hill," 
down  in  town,"  is,  or  was,  a  tidy  old  elm,  which 
was  said  to  have  been  hooped  with  iron  to  protect 
it  from  Indian  tomahawks  (Credat  Hahncman- 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   307 

««s),  and  to  have  grown  round  its  hoops  and 
buried  them  in  its  wood.  Of  course,  this  is  not 
the  tree  my  relative  means. 

Also,  I  have  a  very  pretty  letter  from  Nor- 
wich, Connecticut,  telling  me  of  two  noble  elms 
which  are  to  be  seen  in  that  town.  One  hundred 
and  twenty-seven  feet  from  bough-end  to  bough- 
end!  What  do  you  say  to  that?  And  gentle 
ladies  beneath  it,  that  love  it  and  celebrate  its 
praises!  And  that  in  a  town  of  such  supreme, 
audacious, Alpine  loveliness  as  Norwich! — Only 
the  dear  people  there  must  learn  to  call  it  Nor- 
ridge,  and  not  be  misled  by  the  mere  accident 
of  spelling. 

Norwich. 

Porc/zmouth. 

Cincinnata/z. 

What  a  sad  picture  of  our  civilization! 

I  did  not  speak  to  you  of  the  great  tree  on 
what  used  to  be  the  Coleman  farm, in  Deerfield, 
simply  because  I  had  not  seen  it  for  many  years, 
and  did  not  like  to  trust  my  recollection.  But 
I  had  it  in  memory,  and  even  noted  down,  as 
one  of  the  finest  trees  in  symmetry  and  beauty  I 
had  ever  seen.  I  have  received  a  document, 
signed  by  two  citizens  of  a  neighboring  town, 
certified  by  the  postmaster  and  a  selectman ; 
and  these  again  corroborated,  reinforced,  and 
sworn  to  by  a  member  of  the  extraordinary  col- 
lege-class to  which  it  is  the  good  fortune  of  my 
friend  the  Professor  to  belong,  who, though  he  has 
formerly  been  a  member  of  Congress,  is,  I  be- 
lieve, fully  worthy  of  confidence.  The  tree 
"girts"  eighteen  and  a  half  feet,  and  spreads 


308  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

over  a  hundred,  and  is  a  real  beauty.   I  hope  to 
meet  my  friend  under  its  branches  yet;    if  we 
don't,  have   "youth    at  the  prow,"  we  will  have 
"pleasure  at  the  'elm." 

And  just  now,  again,!  have  got  a  letter  about 
some  grand  willows  in  Maine,  and  another 
about  an  elm  in  Wayland,  but  too  late  for  any- 
thing but  thanks. 

[And  this  leads  me  to  say, that  I  have  received 
a  great  many  communications,  in  prose  and 
verse,  since  I  began  printing  these  notes.  The 
last  came  this  morning,  in  the  shape  of  a  neat 
and  brief  poem, from  New  Orleans.  I  could  not 
make  any  of  them  public,  though  sometimes  re- 
quested to  do  so.  Some  of  them  have  given  me 
great  pleasure,  and  encouraged  me  to  believe  I 
had  friends  whose  faces  I  had  never  seen.  If 
you  are  pleased  with  anything  a  writer  says, and 
doubt  whether  to  tell  him  of  it,  do  not  hesitate; 
a  pleasant  word  is  a  cordial  to  one, who  perhaps 
thinks  he  is  tiring  you,  and  so  becomes  tired 
himself.  I  purr  very  loud  over  a  good,  honest 
letter  that  says  pretty  things  to  me.] 

Sometimes  very  young  persons  send  communi- 
cations, which  they  want  forwarded  to  editors; 
and  these  young  persons  do  not  always  seem  to 
have  right  conceptions  of  these  same  editors, 
and  of  the  public,  and  of  themselves.  Here  is 
a  letter  I  wrote  to  one  of  these  young  folks, but, 
on  the  whole,  thought  it  best  not  to  send.  It  is 
not  fair  to  single  out  one  for  such  sharp  advice, 
where  there  are  hundreds  that  are  in  need  of  it. 

DEAR  SIR: — You  seem  to  be  somewhat,  but 
not  a  great  deal,  wiser  than  I  was  at  your  age. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   309 

I  don't  wish  to  be  understood  as  saying  too 
much,  for  I  think,  without  committing  myself 
to  any  opinion  on  my  present  state,  that  I  was 
not  a  Solomon  at  that  stage  of  development. 

You  long  to  "leap  at  a  single  bound  into  cel- 
ebrity." Nothing  is  so  commonplace  as  to 
wish  to  be  remarkable.  Fame  usually  comes  to 
those  who  are  thinking  about  something  else, — 
very  rarely  to  those  who  say  to  themselves, "Go 
to,  now,  let  us  be  a  celebrated  individual!"  The 
struggle  for  fame,  as  such,  commonly  ends  in 
notoriety, — that  ladder  is  easy  to  climb,  but  it 
leads  to  the  pillory  which  is  crowded  with  fools 
who  could  not  hold  their  tongues,  and  rogues 
who  could  not  hide  their  tricks. 

If  you  have  the  consciousness  of  genius,  do 
something  to  show  it.  The  world  is  pretty 
quick,  nowadays,  to  catch  the  flavor  of  true 
originality;  if  you  write  anything  remarkable, 
the  magazines  and  newspapers  will  find  you  out 
as  the  school-boys  find  out  where  the  ripe 
apples  and  pears  are.  Produce  anything  really 
good,  and  an  intelligent  editor  will  jump  at  it. 
Don't  flatter  yourself  that  any  article  of  yours 
is  rejected  because  you  are  unknown  to  fame. 
Nothing  pleases  an  editor  more  than  to  get  any- 
thing worth  having  from  a  new  hand.  There 
is  always  a  dearth  of  really  fine  articles  for  a  first- 
rate  journal;  for,  of  a  hundred  pieces  received, 
ninety  are  at  or  below  the  sea-level;  some  have 
water  enough,  but  no  head;  some  have  head 
enough,  but  no  water;  only  two  or  three  are 
from  full  reservoirs,  high  up  that  hill  which  is 
so  hard  to  climb. 


310  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

You  may  have  genius.  The  contrary  is  of 
course  probable,  but  it  is  not  demonstrated.  If 
you  have,  the  world  wants  you  more  than  you 
want  it.  It  has  not  only  a  desire  but  a  passion, 
for  every  spark  of  genius  that  shows  itself  among 
us;  there  is  not  a  bull-calf  in  our  national  past- 
ure that  can  bleat  a  rhyme  but  it  is  ten  to  one, 
among  his  friends,  and  no  takers,  that  he  is  the 
real,  genuine,  no-mistake  Osiris. 

gtfest  ce  qu'ilajait?  What  has  he  done  ?  That 
was  Napoleon's  test.  What  have  you  done  ?  Turn 
up  the  faces  of  your  picture-cards,  my  boy !  You 
need  not  make  mouths  at  the  public  because  it 
has  not  accepted  you  at  your  own  fancy-valua- 
tion. Do  the  prettiest  thing  you  can  and  wait 
your  time. 

For  the  verses  you  send  me,  I  will  not  say 
they  are  hopeless,  and  I  dare  not  affirm  that 
they  show  promise.  I  am  not  an  editor,  but  I 
know  the  standard  of  some  editors.  You  must 
not  expect  to  "leap  with  a  single  bound"  into 
the  society  of  those  whom  it  is  not  flattery  to 
call  your  betters.  When  "The  Pactolian"  has 
paid  you  for  a  copy  of  verses — (I  can  furnish  you 
a  list  of  alliterative  signatures,  beginning  with 
Annie  Aureole  and  ending  with  Zoe  Zenith), — 
when  "The  Ragbag"  has  stolen  your  piece, 
after  carefully  scratching  your  name  out, — when 
"The  Nut-cracker"  has  thought  you  worth  shell- 
ing, and  strung  the  kernel  of  your  cleverest 
poem, — then,  and  not  till  then,  you  may  con- 
sider the  presumption  against  you,  from  the  fact 
of  your  rhyming  tendency,  as  called  in  ques- 
tion, and  let  our  friends  hear  from  you,  if  you 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  3!  I 

think  it  worth  while.  You  may  possbly  think 
me  too  candid, and  even  accuse  me  of  incivility; 
but  let  me  assure  you  that  I  am  not  half  so  plain- 
spoken  as  Nature,  nor  half  so  rude  as  Time. 
If  you  prefer  the  long  jolting  of  public  opinion 
to  the  gentle  touch  of  friendship,  try  it  like  a 
man.  Only  remember  this,  that,  if  a  bushel  of 
potatoes  is  shaken  in  a  market-cart  without 
springs  to  it,  the  small  potatoes  always  get  to 
the  bottom.  Believe  me,  etc.,  etc. 

I  always  think  of  verse-writers  when  I  am  in 
this  vein ;  for  these  are  by  far  the  most  exact- 
ing, eager,  self-weighing,  restless,  querulous, 
unreasonable  literary  persons  one  is  like  to  meet 
with.  Is  a  young  man  in  the  habit  of  writing 
verses?  Then  the  presumption  is  that  he  is  an 
inferior  person.  For,  look  you,  there  are  at 
least  nine  chances  in  ten  that  he  writes  poor 
verses.  Now  the  habit  of  chewing  on  rhymes 
without  sense  and  soul  to  match  them  is  like 
that  of  using  any  other  narcotic,  at  once  a  proof 
of  feebleness  and  a  debilitating  agent.  A  young 
man  can  get  rid  of  the  presumption  against  him 
afforded  by  his  writing  verses  only  by  convinc- 
ing us  that  they  are  verses  worth  writing. 

All  this  sounds  hard  and  rough,  but,  observe, 
it  is  not  addressed  to  any  individual,  and  of 
course  does  not  refer  to  any  reader  of  these 
pages.  I  would  always  treat  any  given  young 
person  passing  through  the  meteoric  showers 
which  rain  down  on  the  brief  period  of  adoles- 
cence with  great  tenderness.  God  forgive  us, 
if  we  ever  speak  harshly  to  young  creatures  on 
the  strength  of  these  ugly  truths,  and  so,  sooner 


312   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

or  later,  smite  some  tender-souled  poet  or  poet- 
ess on  the  lips  who  might  have  sung  the  world 
into  sweet  trances, had  we  not  silenced  the  mat- 
in song  in  its  first  low  breathings!  Just  as  my 
heart  yearns  over  the  unloved,  just  so  it  sorrows 
for  the  ungifted  who  are  doomed  to  the  pangs 
of  an  undeceived  self-estimate.  I  have  always 
tried  to  be  gentle  with  the  most  hopeless  cases. 
My  experience,  however,  has  not  been  encour- 
aging. 

X.  Y.,  aet.  eighteen,  a  cheaply-got-up  youth, 
with  narrow  jaws,  and  broad,  bony,  cold,  red 
hands,  having  been  laughed  at  by  the  girls  in 
his  village,  and  "got  the  mitten"  (pronounced 
mitt/n)  two  or  three  times,  falls  to  souling  and 
controlling,  and  youthing  and  truthing  in  the 
newspapers.  Sends  me  some  strings  of  verses, 
candidates  for  the  Orthopedic  Infirmary,  all  of 
them,  in  which  I  learn  for  the  millionth  time 
one  of  the  following  facts:  either  that  something 
about  a  chime  is  sublime, or  that  something  about 
a  chime  is  concerned  with  time,  or  that  some- 
thing about  a  rhyme  is  sublime  or  concerned 
with  time  or  with  a  chime.  Wishes  my  opinion 
of  the  same,  with  advice  as  to  his  future  course. 

What  shall  I  do  about  it?  Tell  him  the 
whole  truth,  and  send  him  a  ticket  of  admission 
to  the  Institution  for  Idiots  and  Feeble-minded 
Youth?  One  doesn't  like  to  be  cruel,  and  yet 
one  hates  to  lie.  Therefore  one  softens  down 
the  ugly  central  fact  of  donkeyism, — recom- 
mends study  of  good  modsls, — that  writing  verse 
should  be  an  incidental  occupation  only,  not  in- 
terfering with  the  hoe,  the  needle,  the  lapstone, 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  313 

or  the  ledger,  and,  above  all,  that  there  should 
be  no  hurry  in  printing  what  is  written.  Not 
the  least  use  in  all  this.  The  poetaster  who  has 
tasted  type  is  done  for.  He  is  like  the  man  who 
has  once  been  a  candidate  for  the  Presidency. 
He  feeds  on  the  madder  of  his  delusion  all  his 
days,  and  his  very  bones  grow  red  with  the  glow 
of  his  foolish  fancy.  One  of  these  young  brains 
is  like  a  bunch  of  India  crackers;  once  touch 
fire  to  it  and  it  is  best  to  keep  hands  off  until  it 
has  done  popping — if  it  ever  stops.  I  have  two 
letters  on  file;  one  is  a  pattern  of  adulation,  the 
other  of  impertinence.  My  reply  to  the  first, 
containing  the  best  advice  I  could  give,  con- 
veyed in  courteous  language,  had  brought  out 
the  second.  There  was  some  sport  in  this,  but 
Dullness  is  not  commonly  a  game  fish, and  only 
sulks  after  he  is  struck.  You  may  set  it  down  ' 
as  a  truth  which  admits  of  few  exceptions,  that 
those  who  ask  your  opinion  really  want  your 
praise,  and  will  be  contented  with  nothing  else. 
There  is  another  kind  of  application  to  which 
editors  or  those  supposed  to  have  access  to  them, 
are  liable,  and  which  often  proves  trying  and 
painful.  One  is  appealed  to  in  behalf  of  some 
person  in  needy  circumstances  who  wishes  to 
make  a  living  by  the  pen.  A  manuscript  ac- 
companying the  letter  is  offered  for  publication. 
It  is  not  commonly  brilliant,  too  often  lamentably 
deficient.  If  Rachel's  saying  is  true,  that  "for- 
tune is  the  measure  of  intelligence,"  then  poverty 
is  evidence  of  limited  capacity,  which  it  too  fre- 
quently proves  to  be,  notwithstanding  a  noble 
exception  here  and  there.  Now  an  editor  is 


314  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

a  person  under  contract  with  the  public  to  fur- 
nish them  with  the  best  things  he  can  afford  for 
his  money.  Charity  shown  by  the  publication 
of  an  inferior  article  would  be  like  the  gener- 
osity of  Claude  Duval  and  the  other  gentlemen 
highwaymen,  who  pitied  the  poor  so  much  they 
robbed  the  rich  to  have  the  means  of  relieving 
them. 

Though  I  am  not  and  never  was  an  editor,  I 
know  something  of  the  trials  to  which  they  are 
submitted.  They  have  nothing  to  do  but  to  de- 
velop enormous  callouses  at  every  point  of  con- 
tact with  authorship.  Their  business  is  not  a 
matter  of  sympathy,  but  of  intellect.  They  must 
reject  the  unfit  productions  of  those  whom  they 
long  to  befriend,  because  it  would  be  a  profli- 
gate charity  to  accept  them.  One  cannot  burn 
his  house  down  to  warm  the  hands  even  of  the 
fatherless  and  the  widow. 

THE  PROFESSOR  UNDER  CHLOROFORM. 

You  haven't  heard  about  my  friend  the  Pro- 
fessor's first  experiment  in  the  use  of  anaesthet- 
ics, have  you? 

He  was  mightily  pleased  with  the  reception 
of  that  poem  of  his  about  the  chaise.  He  spoke 
to  me  once  or  twice  about  another  poem  of 
similar  character  he  wanted  to  read  me,  which 
I  told  him  I  would  listen  to  and  criticise. 

One  day  after  dinner,  he  came  in  with  his 
face  tied  up,  looking  very  red  in  the  cheeks 
and  heavy  about  the  eyes, — Hy'r'ye? — he  said, 
and  made  for  an  arm-chair,  in  which  he  placed 
first  his  hat  and  then  his  person,  going  smack 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  315 

through  the  crown  of  the  former  as  neatly  as 
they  do  the  trick  at  the  circus.  The  Professor 
jumped  at  the  explosion  as  if  he  had  sat  down 
on  one  of  those  small  caltrops  our  grandfathers 
used  to  sow  round  in  the  grass  when  there  were 
Indians  about, — iron  stars,  each  ray  a  rusty 
thorn  an  inch  and  a  half  long, — stick  through 
moccasins  into  feet, — cripple  'em  on  the  spot, 
and  give  'em  lockjaw  in  a  day  or  two. 

The  Professor  let  off  one  of  those  big  words 
which  lie  at  the  bottom  of  the  best  man's  vocab- 
ulary, but  perhaps  never  turn  up  in  his  life, — 
just  as  every  man's  hair  may  stand  on  end,  but 
in  most  men  it  never  does. 

After  he  had  got  calm,  he  pulled  out  a  sheet 
or  two  of  manuscript,  together  with  a  smaller 
scrap,  on  which,  as  he  said,  he  had  just  been 
writing  an  introduction  or  prelude  to  the  main 
performance.  A  certain  suspicion  had  come 
into  my  mind  that  the  Professor  was  not  quite 
right,  which  was  confirmed  by  the  way  he 
talked;  but  I  let  him  begin.  This  is  the  way 
he  read  it: — 

PRELUDE. 

I'm  the  fellah  that  tole  one  day 

The  tale  of  the  won'erful  one-hoss-shay, 

Wan'  to  hear  another?     Say. 

—Funny,  wasn't  it?     Made  me  laugh, — 

I'm  too  modest,  I  am,  by  half, — 

Made  me  laugh' s  though  I  sh^d  split, — 

Cahn'  a  fellah  like  fellah's  own  wit? 

—Fellahs  keep  sayin',— "Well,  now  that's  nice; 

Did  it  once,  but  cahn'  do  it  twice." — 

Don'  you  b'lieve  the'z  no  more  fat; 

Lots  in  the  kitch'n  'z  good  'z  that. 


316  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Fus'-rate  throw,  'n'  no  mistake, — 
Han'   us  the  props  for  another  shake; — 
Know  I'll  try,  'n'  guess  I'll  win; 
Here  sh'  goes  for  hit  'm  ag'in! 

Here  I  thought  it  necessary  to  interpose. 
Professor, — I  said, — you  are  inebriated.  The 
style  of  what  you  call  your  "Prelude"  shows 
that  it  was  written  under  cerebral  excitement. 
Your  articulation  is  confused.  You  have  told 
me  three  times  in  succession,  in  exactly  the 
same  words,  that  I  was  the  only  true  friend  you 
had  in  the  world  that  you  would  unbutton  your 
heart  to.  You  smell  distinctly  and  decidedly 
of  spirits. — I  spoke  and  paused;  tender,  but 
firm. 

Two  large  tears  orbed  themselves  beneath 
the  Professor's  lids, — in  obedience  to  the  prin- 
ciple of  gravitation  celebrated  in  that  delicious 
bit  of  bladdery  bathos,  "The  very  law  that 
moulds  a  tear,"  with  which  the  "Edinburgh 
Review"  attempted  to  put  down  Master  George 
Gordon  when  that  young  man  was  foolishly  try- 
ing to  make  himself  conspicuous. 

One  of  these  tears  peeped  over  the  edge  of 
the  lid  until  it  lost  its  balance, — slid  an  inch  and 
waited  for  reinforcements, — swelled  again, — 
rolled  down  a  little  further, — stopped, — moved 
on, — and  at  last  fell  on  the  back  of  the  Profess- 
or's hand.  He  held  it  up  for  me  to  look  at,  and 
lifted  his  eyes,  brimful,  till  they  met  mine. 

I  couldn't  stand  it, — I  always  break  down 
when  folks  cry  in  my  face, —  so  I  hugged  him 
and  said  he  was  a  dear  old  boy,  and  asked  him 
kindly  what  was  the  matter  with  him,  and  what 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  317 

made  him  smell  so  dreadfully  strong   of  spirits. 

Upset  his  alcohol  lamp, — he  said, — and  spilt 
the  alcohol  on  his  legs.  That  was  it. — But  what 
had  he  been  doing  to  get  his  head  into  such  a 
state? — had  he  really  committed  an  excess? — 
What  was  the  matter? — Then  it  came  out  that 
he  had  been  taking  chloroform  to  have  a  tooth 
out,  which  had  left  him  in  a  very  queer  state, 
in  which  he  had  written  the  "Prelude"  given 
above,  and  under  the  influence  of  which  he  evi- 
dently was  still. 

I  took  the  manuscript  from  his  hands  and 
read  the  following  continuation  of  the  lines  he 
had  begun  to  read  me,  while  he  made  up  for 
two  or  three  nights1  lost  sleep  as  he  best  might. 

PARSON   T.URKELL'S    LEGACY: 

Or  the  President's  Old  Arm  Chair, 

Facts  respecting  an  old  arm  chair. 

At  Cambridge.    Is  kept  in  the  College  there. 

Seems  but  little  worse  for  wear. 

That's  remarkable  when  I  say 

It  was  old  in  President  Holyoke's  day. 

(One  of  his  boys,  perhaps  you  know, 

Died,  at  one  hundred,  years  ago.) 

He  took  lodging  for  rain  or  shine 

Under  green  bed-clothes  in  '69. 

Know  old  Cambridge?     Hopeyoudo. — 
Born  there?     Don't  say  so!  I  was  too. 
(Born  in  a  house  with  a  gambrel-roof, — 
Standing  still,  if  you  must  have  proof. — 
"Gambrel? — Gambrel?'' — let  me  beg 
You'll  look  at  a  horsa's  hinder  leg, — 
First  great  angle  above  the  hoof, — 
That's  the  gambrel;  hence  gambrel-roof.) 


3l8  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

— Nicest  place  that  ever  was  seen, — 
Colleges  red  and  common  green, 
Sidewalks  brownish  with  trees  between. 
Sweetest  spot  beneath  the  skies 
When  the  canker-worms  don't  rise, — 
When  the  dust,  that  sometimes  flies 
Into  your  mouth  and  ears  and  eyes, 
In  a  quiet  slumber  lies, 
Not  in  the  shape  of  unbaked  pies 
Such  as  barefoot  children  prize. 

A  kind  of  harbor  it  seems  to  be, 

Facing  the  flow  of  a  boundless  sea. 

Rows  of  gray  old  Tutors  stand 

Ranged  like  rocks  above  the  sand; 

Rolling  beneath  them,  soft  and  green, 

Breaks  the  tide  of  bright  sixteen,— 

One  wave,  two  waves,  three  waves,  four 

Sliding  up  the  sparkling  floor; 

Then  it  ebbs  to  flow  no  more, 

Wandering  off  from  shore  to  shore 

With  its  freight  of  golden  ore! 

— Pleasant  place  for  boys  to  play;— 

Better  keep  your  girls  away; 

Hearts  get  rolled  as  pebbles  do 

Which  countless  fingering  waves  pursue, 

And  every  classic  beach  is  strown 

With  heart-shaped  pebbles  of  blood-red  stone. 

But  this  is  neither  here  nor  there; — 
I'm  talking  about  an  old  arm  chair. 
You've  heard,  no  doubt,  of  Parson  Turrellf 
Over  at  Medford  he  used  to  dwell; 
Married  one  of  the  Mathers'  folk; 
Got  with  his  wife  a  chair  of  oak, — 
Funny  old  chair,  with  seat  like  wedge, 
Sharp  behind  and  broad  front  edge, — 
One  of  the  oddest  of  human  things. 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  319 

Turned  all  over  with  knobs  and  rings,— 

But  heavy,  and  wide,  and  deep,  and  grand, — 

Fit  for  the  worthiest  of  the  land, — 

Chief  Justice  Sewall  a  cause  to  try  in, 

Or  Cotton  Mather  to  sit — and  lie — in. 

Parson  Turrell  bequeathed  the  same 

To  a  certain  student,  Smith,  by  name; 

These  are  the  terms,  as  we  are  told : 

"Saide  Smith  saide  chaire  to  have  and  holde; 

When  he  doth  graduate,  then  to  passe 

To  ye  oldest  Youth  in  ye  Senior  Classe, 

On  Payment  of — (naming  a  certain  sum) — 

"By  him  to  whom  ye  Chaire  shall  come; 

He  to  ye  oldest  Senior  next, 

And  so  forever," — (thus  runs  the  text) — 

"But  one  Crown  lesse  than  he  gave  to  claime, 

That  being  his  Debte  for  use  of  same." 

Smith  transferred  it  to  one  of  the  Browns, 

And  took  his  money,— five  silver  crowns. 

Brown  delivered  it  up  to  Moore, 

Who  paid,  it  is  plain,  not  five,  but  four. 

Moore  made  over  the  chair  to  Lee, 

Who  gave  him  crowns  of  silver  three. 

Lee  conveyed  it  unto  Drew, 

And  now  the  payment,  of  course,  was  two. 

Drew  gave  up  the  chair  to  Dunn, — 

All  he  got,  as  you  see,  was  one. 

Dunn  released  the  chair  to  Hall, 

And  got  by  the  bargain  no  crown  at  all. 

And  now  it  passed  to  a  second  Brown, 

Who  took  it,  and  likewise  claimed  a  crown. 

When  Brown  conveyed  it  unto  Ware, 

Having  had  one  crown  to  make  it  fair, 

He  paid  him  two  crowns  to  take  the  chair, 

And  Ware,  being  honest  (as  all  Wares  be), 

He  paid  one  Potter,  who  took  it,  three. 


32O  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Four  got  Robinson;  five  got  Dix; 
Johnson  primus  demanded  six; 
And  so  the  sum  kept  gathering  still 
Till  after  the  battle  of  Bunker's  Hill, 
— When  paper  money  became  so  cheap, 
Folks  wouldn't  count  it,  but  said  "a  heap," 
A  certain  Richards,  the  books  declare, 
(A.  M    in  '90?     I've  looked  with  care 
Through  the  Triennial, — name  not  there.) 
This  person,  Richards,  was  offered  then 
Eight  score  pounds,  but  would  have  ten; 
Nine,  I  think,  was  the  sum  he  took, — 
Not  quite  certain, — but  see  the  book. 
By  and  by  the  wars  were  still, 
But  nothing  had  altered  the  Parson's  will. 
The  old  arm  chair  was  solid  yet, 
But  saddled  with  such  a  monstrous  debt! 
Things  grew  quite  too  bad  to  bear, 
Paying  such  sums  to  get  rid  of  the  chair! 
But  dead  men's  fingers  hold  awful  tight, 
And  there  was  the  will  in  black  and  white, 
Plain  enough  for  a  child  to  spell. 
What  should  be  done  no  man  could  tell, 
For  the  chair  was  a  kind  of  nightmare  curse, 
And  every  season  but  made  it  worse. 

As  a  last  resort,  to  clear  the  doubt, 

They  got  old  Governor  Hancock  out. 

The  Governor  came,  with  his  Light-horse  Troop 

And  his  mounted  truckmen,  all  cock-a-hoop; 

Halberds  glittered  and  colors  flew, 

French  horns  whinnied  and  trumpets  blew, 

The  yellow  fifes  whistled  between  their  teeth, 

And  the  bumble-bee  bass-drums  boomed  beneath; 

So  he  rode  with  all  his  band, 

Till  the  President  met  him,  cap  in  hand. 

— The  Governor  "hefted"  the  crowns  and  said, — 

"A  will  is  a  will,  and  the  Parson's  dead." 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   32! 

The  Governor  hefted  the  crowns.     Said  he, — 

"There  is  your  p'int.     And  here's  my  fee. 

These  are  the  terms  you  must  fulfill — 

On  such  conditions  /  break  the  •will!" 

The  Governor  mentioned  what  these  should  be. 

(Just  wait  a  minute  and  then  you'll  see.) 

The  President  prayed.     Then  all  was  still, 

And  the  Governor  rose  and  broke  the  will! 

—"About  these  conditions?"     Well,  now  you  go 

And  do  as  I  tell  you,  and  then  you'll  know. 

Once  a  year,  on  Commencement-day, 

If  you'll  only  take  the  pains  to  stay, 

You'll  see  the  President  in  the  chair, 

Likewise  the  Governor  sitting  there. 

The  President  rises;  both  old  and  young 

May  hear  his  speech  in  a  foreign  tongue, 

The  meaning  whereof,  as  lawyers  swear, 

Is  this:     Can  I  keep  this  old  arm  chair? 

And  then  his  Excellency  bows, 

As  much  as  to  say  that  he  allows. 

The  Vice-Gub.  next  is  called  by  name; 

He  bows  like  t'other,  which  means  the  same. 

And  all  the  officers  round  'em  bow, 

As  much  as  to  say  that  they  allow. 

And  a  lot  of  parchments  about  the  chair 

Are  handed  to  witnesses  then  and  there, 

And  then  the  lawyers  hold  it  clear 

That  the  chair  is  safe  for  another  year. 

God  bless  you,  Gentlemen!     Learn  to  give 

Money  to  colleges  while  you  live. 

Don't  be  silly  and  think  you'll  try 

To  bother  the  colleges,  when  you  die, 

With  codicil  this  and  codicil  that, 

That  Knowledge  may  starve  while  Law  grows  fat; 

For  there  never  was  pitcher  that  wouldn't  spill, 

And  there's  always  a  flaw  in  a  donkey's  will! 


322   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

Hospitality  is  a  good  deal  a  matter  of  lati- 
tude, I  suspect.  The  shade  of  a  palm-tree 
serves  an  African  for  a  hut;  his  dwelling  is  all 
door  and  no  walls;  everybody  can  come  in. 
To  make  a  morning  call  on  an  Esquimaux  ac- 
quaintance, one  must  creep  through  a  long  tun- 
nel; his  house  is  all  walls  and  no  door,  except' 
such  a  one  as  an  apple  with  a  worm  hole  has. 
One  might,  very  probably,  trace  a  regular  gra- 
dation between  these  two  extremes.  In  cities 
where  the  evenings  are  generally  hot  the  people 
have  porches  at  their  doors,  where  they  sit,  and 
this  is,  of  course,  a  provocative  to  the  inter- 
change of  civilities.  A  good  deal,  which  in 
colder  regions  is  ascribed  to  mean  dispositions, 
belongs  really  to  mean  temperature. 

Once  in  a  while,  even  in  our  Northern  cities, 
at  noon,  in  a  very  hot  summer's  day,  one  may 
realize,  by  a  sudden  extension  in  his  sphere  of 
consciousness,  how  closely  he  is  shut  up  for  the 
most  part.  Do  you  not  remember  something 
like  this?  July,  between  i  and  2  p.  M.,  Fah- 
renheit 96°,  or  thereabout.  Windows  all  gaping, 
like  the  mouths  of  panting  dogs.  Long,  sting- 
ing cry  of  a  locust  comes  in  from  a  tree,  half  a 
mile  off;  had  forgotten  there  was  such  a  tree. 
Baby's  screams  from  a  house  several  blocks 
distant; — never  knew  of  any  babies  in  the 
neighborhood  before.  Tinman  pounding  some- 
thing that  clatters  dreadfully, — very  distinct, 
but  don't  know  of  any  tinman's  shop  near  by. 
Horses  stamping  on  a  pavement  to  get  off  flies. 
When  you  hear  these  four  sounds,  you  may  set 
it  down  as  a  warm  day.  Then  it  is  that  one 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE   323 

would  like  to  imitate  the  mode  of  life  of  the  na- 
tive at  Sierra  Leone,  as  somebody  has  described 
it:  stroll  into  the  market  in  natural  costume, — 
buy  a  watermelon  for  a  half-penny, — split  it  and 
ccoop  out  the  middle, — sit  down  in  one  half  of 
the  empty  rind,  clap  the  other  on  one's  head, and 
feast  upon  the  pulp. 

I  see  some  of  the  London  Journals  have  been 
attacking  some  of  their  literary  people  for  lec- 
turing, on  the  ground  of  its  being  a  public  ex- 
hibition of  themselves  for  money.  A  popular 
author  can  print  his  lecture;  if  he  deliver  it,  it 
is  a  case  of  qucestum  corpore,  or  making  profit 
of  his  person.  None  but  "snobs"  do  that.  Er- 
go, etc.  To  this  I  reply,  Negatur  minor.  Her 
Most  Gracious  Majesty,  the  Queen,  exhibits 
herself  to  the  public  as  a  part  of  the  service  for 
which  she  is  paid.  We  do  not  consider  it  low- 
bred in  her  to  pronounce  her  own  speech,  and 
should  prefer  it  so  to  hearing  it  from  any  other 
person  or  reading  it.  His  Grace  and  his  Lord- 
ship exhibit  themselves  very  often  for  popular- 
ity, and  their  houses  every  day  for  money.  No, 
if  a  man  shows  himself  other  than  he  is,  if  he 
belittles  himself  before  an  audience  for  hire, 
then  he  acts  unworthily.  But  a  true  word, fresh 
from  the  lips  of  a  true  man,  is  worth  paying  for, 
at  the  rate  of  eight  dollars  a  day,  or  even  of 
fifty  dollars  a  lecture.  The  taunt  must  be  an 
outbreak  of  jealousy  against  the  renowned  au- 
thors who  have  the  audacity  to  be  also  orators. 
The  sub-lieutenants  (of  the  press)  stick  a  too  pop- 
ular writer  and  speaker  with  an  epithet  in  Eng- 
land,instead  of  with  a  rapier,asin  France.  Poh  ! 


324   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

All  England  is  one  great  menagerie,  and,  all 
at  once,  the  jackal,  who  admires  the  gilded 
cage  of  the  royal  beast,  must  protest  against 
the  vulgarity  of  the  talking-bird's  and  the  night- 
ingale's being  willing  to  become  a  part  of  the 
exhibition! 

THE  LONG  PATH. 

(Last  of  the  Parentheses.) 

Yes,  that  was  my  last  walk  with  the  school- 
mistress. It  happened  to  be  the  end  of  a  term ; 
and  before  the  next  began,  a  very  nice  young 
woman,  who  had  been  her  assistant,  was  an- 
nounced as  her  successor,  and  she  was  provided 
for  elsewhere.  So  it  was  no  longer  the  school- 
mistress that  I  walked  with,  but — Let  us  not 
be  in  unseemly  haste.  I  shall  call  her  the 
schoolmistress  still;  some  of  you  love  her  un- 
der that  name. 

When  it  became  known  among  the  boarders 
that  two  of  their  number  had  joined  hands  to 
walk  down  the  long  path  of  life  side  by  side, 
there  was,  as  you  may  suppose,  no  small  sen- 
sation. I  confess  I  pitied  our  landlady.  It  took 
her  all  of  a  suddin, — she  said.  Had  not  known 
that  we  was  keepin'  company,  and  never  mis- 
trusted anything  partic'lar.  Ma'am  was  right 
to  better  herself.  Didn't  look  very  rugged  to 
take  care  of  a  femily,  but  could  get  hired  help, 
she  calc'lated.  The  great  maternal  instinct 
came  crowding  up  in  her  soul  just  then,  and  her 
eyes  wandered  till  they  settled  on  her  daughter. 

No,  poor,  dear  woman, — that  could  not  have 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  325 

been.  But  I  am  dropping  one  of  my  internal 
tears  for  you,  with  this  pleasant  smile  on  my 
face  all  the  time. 

The  great  mystery  of  God's  providence  is  the 
permitted  crushing  out  of  flowering  instincts. 
Life  is  maintained  by  the  respiration  of  oxygen - 
and  of  sentiments.  In  the  long  catalogue  of 
scientific  cruelties,  there  is  hardly  anything 
quite  so  painful  to  think  of  as  that  experiment 
of  putting  an  animal  under  the  bell  of  an  air- 
pump  and  exhausting  the  air  from  it.  (I  never 
saw  the  accursed  trick  performed.  Laus  Deo!] 
There  comes  a  time  when  the  souls  of  human 
beings,  women,  perhaps,  more  even  than  men, 
begin  to  faint  for  the  atmosphere  of  the  affec- 
tions they  were  made  to  breathe.  Then  it  is 
that  Society  places  its  transparent  bell-glass  over 
the  young  woman  who  is  to  be  the  subject  of  one 
of  its  fatal  experiments.  The  element  by  which 
only  the  heart  lives  is  sucked  out  of  her  crystal- 
line prison.  Watch  her  through  its  transparent 
walls  ; — her  bosom  is  heaving;  but  it  is  a  vacu- 
um. Death  is  no  riddle,  compared  to  this.  I 
remember  a  poor  girl's  story  in  the  "Book  of 
Martyrs."  The  "dry-pan  and  the  gradual  fire" 
were  the  images  that  frightened  her  most.  How 
many  have  withered  and  wasted  under  as  slow 
a  torment  in  the  walls  of  that  larger  Inquisition 
which  we  call  Civilization! 

Yes,  my  surface-thought  laughs  at  you,  you 
foolish,  plain,  overdressed,  mincing,  cheaply- 
organized,  self-saturated  young  person;  who- 
ever you  may  be,  now  reading  this, — little 
thinking  you  are  what  I  describe^and  in  blissful 


326  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

unconsciousness  that  you  are  destined  to  the  lin- 
gering asphyxia  of  soul  which  is  the  lot  of  such 
multitudes  worthier  than  yourself.  But  it  is 
only  my  surface  thought  which  laughs.  For 
that  great  procession  of  the  unloved,  who  not 
only  wear  the  crown  of  thorns,  but  must  hide 
it  under  the  locks  of  brown  or  gray, — under  the 
snowy  cap,  under  the  chilling  turban, — hide  it 
even  from  themselves, — perhaps  never  know 
they  wear  it,  though  it  kills  them, — -there  is  no 
depth  of  tenderness  in  my  nature  that  Pity  has 
not  sounded.  Somewhere, — somewhere, — love 
is  in  store  for  them, — the  universe  must  not  be 
allowed  to  fool  them  so  cruelly.  What  infinite 
pathos  in  the  small,  half-unconscious  artifices 
by  which  unattractive  young  persons  seek  to 
recommend  themselves  to  the  favor  of  those  to 
whom  our  dear  sisters,  the  unloved,  like  the 
rest,  are  impelled  by  their  God-given  instincts! 
Read  what  the  singing  women — one  to  ten 
thousand  of  the  suffering  women — tell  us,  and 
think  of  the  griefs  that  die  unspoken!  Nature 
is  in  earnest  when  she  makes  a  woman ;  and 
there  are  women  enough  lying  in  the  next 
churchyard  with  very  commonplace  blue  slate- 
stones  at  their  head  and  feet,  for  whom  it  was 
just  as  true  that  "all  sounds  of  life  assumed  one 
tone  of  love,"  as  for  Letitia  Landon,  of  whom 
Elizabeth  Browning  said  it;  but  she  could  give 
words  to  her  grief,  and  they  could  not. — Will 
you  hear  a  few  stanzas  of  mine? 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE      327 

THE  VCTCELESS. 

We  count  the  broken  lyres  that  rest 

Where  the  sweet  wailing  singers  slumber, — 
But  o'er  their  silent  sister's  breast 

The  wild  flowers  who  will  stoop  to  number? 
A  few  can  touch  the  magic  string, 

And  noisy  Fame  is  proud  to  win  them; — 
Alas  for  those  that  never  sing, 

But  die  with  all  their  music  in  them! 

Nay,  grieve  not  for  the  dead  alone 

Whose  song  has  told  their  hearts'  sad  story, — 
Weep  for  the  voiceless,  who  have  known 

The  cross  without  the  crown  of  glory! 
Not  where  Leucadian  breezes  sweep 

O'er  Sappho's  memory-haunted  billow, 
But  where  the  glistening  night-dews  weep 

On  nameless  sorrow's  churchyard  pillow. 

O  hearts  that  break  and  give  no  sign 

Save  whitening  lip  and  fading  tresses, 
Till  Death  pours  out  his  cordial  wine 

Slow-dropped  from  Misery's  crushing  presses, — 
If  singing  breath  or  echoing  chord 

To  every  hidden  pang  were  given, 
What  endless  melodies  were  poured, 

As  sad  as  earth,  as  sweet  as  heaven! 

I  hope  that  our  landlady's  daughter  is  not  so 
badly  off  after  all.  That  young  man  from  an- 
other city,  who  made  the  remark  which  you  re- 
member about  Boston  State  House  and  Boston 
folks,  has  appeared  at  our  table  repeatedly  of 
late,  and  has  seemed  to  me  rather  attentive  to 
this  young  lady.  Only  last  evening  I  saw  him 
leaning  over  her  while  she  was  playing  the  ac- 


328   THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

cordion, — indeed,  I  undertook  to  join  them  in  a 
song,  and  got  as  far  as,  "Come  rest  in  this 
boo-oo,"  when,  my  voice  getting  tremulous,  I 
turned  off,  as  one  steps  out  of  a  procession,  and 
left  the  basso  and  soprano  to  finish  it.  I  see  no 
reason  why  this  young  woman  should  not  be  a 
very  proper  match  for  a  man  that  laughs  about 
Boston  State  House.  He  can't  be  very  particu- 
lar. 

The  young  fellow  whom  I  have  so  often  men- 
tioned was  a  little  free  in  his  remarks,  but  very 
good-natured. — Sorry  to  have  you  go, — he  said. 
— Schoolma'am  made  a  mistake  not  to  wait  for 
me.  Haven't  taken  anything  but  mournin' 
fruit  at  breakfast  since  I  heard  of  it. — Mourning 
fruit, — said  I, — what's  that? — Huckleberries 
and  blackberries, — said  he; — couldn't  eat  in 
colors,  raspberries,  currants,  and  such,  after 
a  solemn  thing  like  this  happening. — The 
conceit  seemed  to  please  the  young  fellow.  If 
you  will  believe  it,  when  we  came  down  to 
breakfast  the  next  morning,  he  had  carried  it 
out  as  follows.  You  know  those  odious  little 
"saas-plates"  that  figure  so  largely  at  boarding- 
houses,  and  especially  at  taverns,  into  which  a 
strenuous  attendant  female  trowels  little  dabs, 
somber  of  tint  and  heterogeneous  of  composi- 
tion, which  make  you  feel  homesick  to  look  at, 
and  into  which  you  poke  the  elastic  coppery 
teaspoon  with  the  air  of  a  cat  dipping  her  foot 
into  a  wash-tub, — (not  that  I  mean  to  say  any- 
thing against  them,  for,  when  they  are  of  tinted 
porcelain  or  starry  many-faceted  crystal,  and 
hold  clean  bright  berries, or  pale  virgin  honey, or 


THE    AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-T.VBLE    329 

;' lucent  syrups  tinct  with  cinnamon,"  and  the 
teaspoon  is  of  white  silver,  with  the  Hall- 
mark, solid,  but  not  brutally  heavy, — as  people 
in  the  green  stage  of  millionism  will  have  them, 
— I  can  dally  with  their  amber  semi-fluids  or 
glossy  spherules  without  a  shiver), — you  know 
these  small,  deep  dishes,  I  say.  When  we  came 
down  the  next  morning, each  of  these  (two  only 
excepted)  was  covered  with  a  broad  leaf.  On 
lifting  this,  each  boarder  found  a  small  heap  of 
solemn  black  huckleberries.  But  one  of  those 
plates  held  red  currants,  and  was  covered  with 
a  red  rose;  the  other  held  white  currants,  and 
was  covered  with  a  white  rose.  There  was  a 
laugh  at  this  at  first,  and  then  a  short  silence, 
and  I  noticed  that  her  lip  trembled,  and  the  old 
gentleman  opposite  was  in  trouble  to  get  at  his 
bandanna  handkerchief. 

— "What  was  the  use  in  waiting?  We  should 
be  too  late  for  Switzerland,  that  season,  if  we 
waited  much  longer." — The  hand  I  held  trem- 
bled in  mine,  and  the  eyes  fell  meekly,  as 
Esther  bowed  herself  before  the  feet  of  Ahasuerus 
— She  had  been  reading  that  chapter,  for  she 
looked  up, — if  there  was  a  film  of  moisture  over 
her  eyes,  there  was  also  the  faintest  shadow  of 
a  distant  smile  skirting  her  lips,  but  not  enough 
to  accent  the  dimples, — and  said,  in  her  pretty, 
still  way, — "If  it  please  the  king,  and  if  I  have 
found  favor  in  his  sight,  and  the  thing  seem 
right  before  the  king,  and  I  be  pleasing  in  his 
eyes." — 

'  I  don't  remember  what  King  Ahasuerus  did 
or  said  when  Esther  got  just  to  that  point  of  her 


33O  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

soft,  humble  words, — but  I  know  what  I  did. 
That  quotation  from  Scripture  was  cut  short, 
anyhow.  We  came  to  a  compromise  on  the 
great  question  and  the  time  was  settled  for  the 
last  day  of  summer. 

In  the  meantime,  I  talked  on  with  our  board- 
ers much  as  usual,  as  you  may  see  by  what  I 
have  reported.  I  must  say  I  was  pleased  with  a 
certain  tenderness  they  all  showed  towards  us, 
after  the  first  excitement  of  the  news  was  over. 
It  came  out  in  trivial  matters, — but  each  one,  in 
his  or  her  way,  manifested  kindness.  Our 
landlady,  for  instance,  when  we  had  chicken, 
sent  the  liver  instead  of  the  gizzard,  with  the 
wing,  for  the  schoolmistress.  This  was  not  an 
accident;  the  two  are  never  mistaken,  though 
some  landladies  appear  as  if  they  did  not  knovV 
the  difference.  The  whole  of  the  company 
were  even  more  respectfully  attentive  than  usual. 
There  was  no  idle  punning,  and  very  little 
winking  on  the  part  of  that  lively  young  gentle- 
man, who,  as  the  reader  may  remember,  oc- 
casionally interposed  some  playful  question  or 
remark  which  could  hardly  be  considered  rel- 
evant— except  when  the  least  allusion  was  made 
to  matrimony,  when  he  would  look  at  the  land- 
lady's daughter  and  wink  with  both  sides  of  his 
face  until  she  would  ask  what  he  was  pokin'  his 
fun  at  her  for,  and  if  he  wasn't  ashamed  of 
himself.  In  fact, they  all  behaved  very  hand- 
somely, so  that  I  really  felt  sorry  at  the  thought 
of  leaving  my  boarding-house. 

I  suppose  you  think,  that,  because  I  lived  at  a" 
plain    widow-woman's    plain   table,    I    was   of 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  33! 

course  more  or  less  infirm  in  point  of  worldly 
fortune.  You  may  not  be  sorry  to  learn,  that, 
though  not  what  great  merchants  call  very  rich, 
I  was  comfortable, — comfortable, — so  that  most 
of  those  moderate  luxuries  I  described  in  my 
verses  on  Contentment — most  of  them,  I  say — 
were  within  our  reach  if  we  chose  to  have  them. 
But  I  found  out  that  the  schoolmistress  had  a 
vein  of  charity  about  her,  which  had  hitherto 
been  worked  on  a  small  silver  and  copper  basis, 
which  made  her  think  less,  perhaps,  of  luxuries 
than  even  I  did, — modestly  as  I  have  expressed 
my  wishes. 

It  is  rather  a  pleasant  thing  to  tell  a  poor 
young  woman,  whom  one  ha's  contrived  to  win 
without  showing  his  rent-roll,  that  she  has  found 
what  the  world  values  so  highly,  in  following 
the  lead  of  her  affections.  That  was  a  luxury 
I  was  now  ready  for. 

I  began  abruptly: — Do  you  know  that  you 
are  a  rich  young  person? 

"1  know  that  I  am  very  rich," — she  said. — 
"Heaven  has  given  me  more  than  I  ever  asked; 
for  I  had  not  thought  love  was  ever  meant  for 
me." 

It  was  a  woman's  confession,  and  her  voice 
fell  to  a  whisper  as  it  threaded  the  last  words. 

I  don't  mean  that, — I  said, — you  blessed  little 
saint  and  seraph! — if  there's  an  angel  missing 
in  the  New  Jerusalem,  inquire  for  her  at  this 
boarding-house! — I  don't  mean  that;  I  mean 
that  I — that  is,  you — am — are — confound  it! — I 
mean  that  you'll  be  what  most  people  call  a  lady 
of  fortune. — And  I  looked  full  in  her  eyes  for 
the  effect  of  the  announcement. 


33 2  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TARLE 

There  wasn't  an}'.  She  said  she  was  thank- 
ful that  I  had  what  would  save  me  from  drudg- 
ery, and  that  some  other  time  I  should  tell  her 
about  it. — I  never  made  a  greater  failure  in  an 
attempt  to  produce  a  sensation. 

So  the  last  da)7  of  summer  came.  It  was  our 
choice  to  go  to  the  church, but  we  had  a  kind  of 
reception  at  the  boarding-house.  The  presents 
were  all  arranged,  and  among  them  none  gave 
more  pleasure  than  the  modest  tributes  of  our 
fellow-boarders, — for  there  was  not  one,  I  be- 
lieve, who  did  not  send  something.  The  land- 
ladjr  would  insist  on  making  an  elegant  bride- 
cake, with  her  own  hands;  to  which  Master 
Benjamin  Franklin  wished  to  add  certain  em- 
bellishments out  of  his  private  funds, — namely, 
a  Cupid  in  a  mouse-trap,  done  in  white  sugar, 
and  two  miniature  flags,  with  the  stars  and 
stripes,  which  had  a  very  pleasing  effect,  I  as- 
sure you.  The  landlady's  daughter  sent  a  richly 
bound  cop)'  of  Tupper's  Poems.  On  a  blank 
leaf  was  the  following,  written  in  a  very  deli- 
cate and  careful  hand: — 

Presented  to     ...     by     ... 

On  the  eve  ere  her  union  in  holy  matrimony. 
May  sunshine  ever  beam  o'er  her. 

Even  the  poor  relative  thought  she  must  do 
something,  and  sent  a  copy  of  "The  Whole 
Duty  of  Man,"  bound  in  very  attractive  varie- 
gated sheepskin,  the  edges  nicely  marbled. 
From  the  divinity-student  came  the  loveliest 
English  edition  of  "Keble's  Christian  Year."  I 
opened  it,  when  it  came, to  the  Fourth  Sunday  in 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  *THE  BREAKFAST  TABLE   333 

Lent,  and  read  that  angelic  poem,  sweeter  than 
anything  I  can  remember  since  Xavier's  "My 
God,  I  love  thee." — I  am  not  a  Churchman, — I 
don't  believe  in  planting  oaks  in  flower-pots, — 
but  such  a  poem  as  "The  Rose-Bud"  makes 
one's  heart  a  proselyte  to  the  culture  it  grows 
from.  Talk  about  it  as  much  as  you  like, — 
one's  breeding  shows  itself  nowhere  more  than 
in  his  religion.  A  man  should  be  a  gentleman 
in  his  hymns  and  prayers;  the  fondness  for 
"scenes,"  among  vulgar  saints,  contrasts  so 
meanly  with  that — 

"God  only  and  good  angels  look 
Behind  the  blissful  scene," 

and  the  other, — 

"He  could  not  trust  his  melting  soul 
But  in  his  Maker's  sight," 

that  I  hope  some  of  them  will  see  this,  and  read 
the  poem  and  profit  by  it. 

My  laughing  and  winking  young  friend  un- 
dertook to  procure  and  arrange  the  flowers  for 
the  table,  and  did  it  with  immense  zeal.  I  never 
saw  him  look  happier  than  when  he  came  in, 
his  hat  saucily  on  one  side,  and  a  cheroot  in  his 
mouth,  with  a  huge  bunch  of  tea-roses,  which 
he  said  were  for  "Madam." 

One  of  the  last  things  that  came  was  an  old 
square  box, smelling  of  camphor, tied  and  sealed. 
It  bore,  in  faded  ink,  the  marks,  "Calcutta, 
1805."  On  opening  it,  we  found  a  white  Cash- 
mere shawl,  with  a  very  brief  note  from  the 
dear  old  gentleman  opposite,  saying  that  he  had 
kept  this  some  years,  thinking  he  might  want 


334  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE 

it,  and  many  more,  not  knowing  what  to  do 
with  it, — that  he  had  never  seen  it  unfolded 
since  he  was  a  young  supercargo, — and  now, 
if  she  would  spread  it  on  her  shoulders,  it  would 
make  him  feel  young  to  look  at  it. 

Poor  Bridget,  or  Biddy,  our  red-armed  maid 
of  all  work!  What  must  she  do  but  buy  a  small 
copper  breastpin  and  put  it  under  Schoolma'am's 
plate  that  morning  at  breakfast?  And  School- 
ma'am  would  wear  it, — though  I  made  her 
cover  it,  as  well  as  I  could,  with  a  tea  rose. 

It  was  my  last  breakfast  as  a  boarder,  and  I 
could  not  leave  them  in  utter  silence. 

Good-bye, — I  said, — my  dear  friends,  one 
and  all  of  you!  I  have  been  long  with  you, 
and  I  find  it  hard  parting.  I  have  to  thank  you 
for  a  thousand  courtesies,  and  above  all  for  the 
patience  and  indulgence  with  which  you  have 
listened  to  me  when  I  have  tried  to  instruct  or 
amuse  you.  My  friend  the  Professor  (who, 
as  well  as  my  friend  the  Poet,  is  unavoidably 
absent  on  this  interesting  occasion)  has  given 
me  reason  to  suppose  that  he  would  occupy  my 
empty  chair  about  the  first  of  January  next.  If 
he  comes  among  you,  be  kind  to  him,  as  you 
have  been  to  me.  May  the  Lord  bless  you  all ! — 
And  we  shook  hands  all  round  the  table. 

Half  an  hour  afterwards  the  breakfast  things 
and  the  cloth  were  gone.  I  looked  up  and  down 
the  length  of  the  bare  boards,  over  which  I  had 
so  often  uttered  my  sentiments  and  experiences 
— and — Yes,  I  am  a  man,  like  another. 

All  sadness  vanished,  as,  in  the  midst  of  these 
old  friends  of  mine,  whom  you  know,  and 


THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST-TABLE  335 

others  a  little  more  up  in  the  world,  perhaps, 
to  whom  I  have  not  introduced  you,  I  took  the 
schoolmistress  before  the  altar  from  the  hands 
of  the  old  gentleman  who  used  to  sit  opposite, 
and  who  would  insist  on  giving  her  away. 

And  now  we  two  are  walking  the  long  path 
in  peace  together.  The  "schoolmistress"  finds 
her  skill  in  teaching  called  for  again,  without 
going  abroad  to  seek  little  scholars.  Those 
visions  of  mine  have  all  come  true. 

I  hope  you  all  love  me  none  the  less  for  any- 
thing I  have  told  you.  Farewell! 


THE    END. 


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